On the viscous dissipation modeling of thermal fluid flow in a porous medium

The problem of viscous dissipation and thermal dispersion in saturated porous medium is numerically investigated for the case of non-Darcy flow regime. The fluid is induced to flow upward by natural convection as a result of a semi-infinite vertical wall that is immersed in the porous medium and is kept at constant higher temperature. The boundary layer approximations were used to simplify the set of the governing, nonlinear partial differential equations, which were then non-dimensionalized and solved using the finite elements method. The results for the details of the governing parameters are presented and investigated. It is found that the irreversible process of transforming the kinetic energy of the moving fluid to heat energy via the viscosity of the moving fluid (i.e.; viscous dissipation) resulted in insignificant generation of heat for the range of parameters considered in this study. On the other hand, thermal dispersion has shown to disperse heat energy normal to the wall more effectively compared with the normal diffusion mechanism. © 2011 Springer-Verlag.