Hydraulic fracturing process in rocks – small-scale simulations with a novel fully coupled DEM/CFD-based thermo-hydro-mechanical approach

Abstract

In the paper, a two-dimensional (2D) numerical simulation of a small-scale hydraulic fracturing process in rock specimens possessing a single injection slot was conducted. A unique DEM/CFD-based pore-scale thermal-hydro-mechanical (THM) model was used to simulate two-phase laminar fluid flow (water and gas) with heat transfer in non-saturated porous materials with low porosity. Using a DEM fully coupled with CFD (based on a fluid flow network composed of channels in a continuous domain between discrete elements) and heat transfer at the mesoscale, a series of numerical calculations for small cohesive granular specimens of simplified spherical mesostructure with one injection slot were carried out. Plane strain compression conditions were assumed. Both the fluid (diffusion and advection) and bonded particles (conduction) were involved in heat transfer. The impacts of the fluid's dynamic viscosity, gas phase content, and temperature difference between the rock matrix and the fluid injection on the process of hydraulic fracture initiation and propagation were all examined in-depth. It was discovered that those effects were all of great significance to the behaviour of a single hydraulic fracture.