Uncertainty Quantification Using Multiscale Methods for Porous Media Flows

Uncertainty Quantification Using Multiscale Methods for Porous Media Flows
Author: Paul Francis Dostert
Publisher:
Total Pages:
Release: 2010
Genre:
ISBN:

In this dissertation we discuss numerical methods used for uncertainty quantification applications to flow in porous media. We consider stochastic flow equations that contain both a spatial and random component which must be resolved in our numerical models. When solving the flow and transport through heterogeneous porous media some type of upscaling or coarsening is needed due to scale disparity. We describe multiscale techniques used for solving the spatial component of the stochastic flow equations. These techniques allow us to simulate the flow and transport processes on the coarse grid and thus reduce the computational cost. Additionally, we discuss techniques to combine multiscale methods with stochastic solution techniques, specifically, polynomial chaos methods and sparse grid collocation methods. We apply the proposed methods to uncertainty quantification problems where the goal is to sample porous media properties given an integrated response. We propose several efficient sampling algorithms based on Langevin diffusion and the Markov chain Monte Carlo method. Analysis and detailed numerical results are presented for applications in multiscale immiscible flow and water infiltration into a porous medium.

A New Multiscale Mixed Method and an Uncertainty Quantification Technique for Porous Media Flows

A New Multiscale Mixed Method and an Uncertainty Quantification Technique for Porous Media Flows
Author: Joyce C. Rigelo
Publisher:
Total Pages: 88
Release: 2013
Genre: Multiscale modeling
ISBN: 9781303424311

There are several challenges associated with the investigation of subsurface flows. In this work we focus on the efficient numerical simulation of such flows in heterogeneous formations and on the characterization of subsurface properties. In this dissertation we present a new multiscale mixed method and an uncertainty quantification technique for porous media flows. This work can be divided as follows: A new multiscale mixed method (MuMM) is proposed to compute the velocity field for single and two-phase flows in porous media. In MuMM, a domain decomposition method based on Robin interface condition is implemented, and hybridized mixed finite elements are used for the spatial discretization of the equations. Local, multiscale mixed basis functions are defined to represent the discrete solutions in subdomains. Appropriate subspaces of the vector space spanned by these basis functions can be considered in the numerical approximations of heterogeneous porous media flow problems. To extend the MuMM for two-phase flows, we introduce computationally efficient algorithms that avoid the update of the mulstiscale mixed basis functions every time step of a simulation. We also propose a Huff'n Puff technique as a screening step in a two- and three-stage MCMC (Markov chain Monte Carlo) procedure for uncertainty quantification of porous media flows. Numerical results are presented indicating that the new procedure is very effective.

Numerical Methods for Porous Media Flow

Numerical Methods for Porous Media Flow
Author: Bradley W. McCaskill
Publisher:
Total Pages: 139
Release: 2018
Genre: Measurement uncertainty (Statistics)
ISBN: 9780438592797

The way in which we manage subsurface resources is directly determined by the availability and quality of information we have about the dynamical systems that govern them. Typically this information is obtained by solving mathematical models that are posed on the domain of interest. Unfortunately, both the construction and process of solving these models can be a nontrivial task. In this dissertation we explore solutions to several problems related to modeling fluid flow through porous media. One aspect of this dissertation is the development of a nonstandard multiscale finite element method for solving elliptic boundary value problems. The so-called multiscale Robin method can be viewed as a merger of traditional domain decomposition methods with the framework of multiscale finite element methods. The novelty of this method is that its efficiency and accuracy are governed by a geometric enrichment of the solution space. An application of the multiscale Robin method to uncertainty quantification through the use of a stochastic representation method is considered. To this end, the multiscale Robin methodology is adapted to the framework of coupled elliptic boundary value problems. A computationally cheap and efficient method for the simulation of two-phase flow through poroelastic media is also proposed. Specifically, through the use of a artificial stabilization term and an element based post processing reasonable estimates of solutions to the associated geomechanic subsystem can be obtained. Finally, we adapt a continuous data assimilation algorithm to a model for miscible flow through porous media. The existence of weak solutions and convergence properties of the resulting model solution are studied. In all chapters a variety of numerical examples are used to evaluate the performance of each proposed solution methodology.

Uncertainty Quantification in Porous Media Fluid Flow

Uncertainty Quantification in Porous Media Fluid Flow
Author: Michael Presho
Publisher:
Total Pages: 157
Release: 2010
Genre: Multiscale modeling
ISBN: 9781124293486

Reservoir fractures, deformation bands, and multiscale heterogeneities are capable of affecting porous media fluid flow in a variety of ways. In terms of fracture effects, we typically encounter an unchanged or increased permeability when considering flow parallel to a fracture, whereas we expect a reduced permeability when considering flow across a deformation band. In considering multiscale heterogeneities, it is important to capture both the fine scale behavior and general trends of related flow scenarios. For the first portion of this dissertation, we assess the effects that deformation bands have on multi-component fluid flow. Under the assumption that the width of a band is a random variable, Monte Carlo simulations can then be performed to obtain statistical representations of the transport quantity in relation to the nature of uncertainty. We introduce a stochastic perturbation model as an alternative to Monte Carlo simulations and compare the results with analytical solutions. For the next topic, we propose a method for efficient solution of pressure equations with multiscale features and randomly perturbed permeability coefficients. We use the multiscale finite element method (MsFEM) as a starting point and mention that the method is intended to be used within a Monte Carlo framework where solutions corresponding to samples of the randomly perturbed data need to be computed. We show that the proposed method converges to the MsFEM solution in the limit for each individual sample of the data. The method is then applied to a standard multi-phase flow problem where a number of permeability samples are constructed for Monte Carlo simulations. We focus our quantities of interest on the Darcy velocity and breakthrough time and quantify their uncertainty by constructing corresponding cumulative distribution functions. In the final portion of the dissertation, we introduce a dual porosity, dual permeability model which accounts for differences in matrix and fracture parameters. Fine scale benchmark solutions are obtained and we perform a comparison between corresponding dual porosity, dual permeability model solutions. In the context of subsurface characterization of fractured reservoirs, we apply the Markov chain Monte Carlo method to the dual porosity, dual permeability model. In doing so, we obtain matrix and fracture permeability fields resulting from a distribution conditioned to dynamic tracer cut data. In all chapters, a number of numerical examples are presented to illustrate the performance of the each approach.

Reduced Order Model and Uncertainty Quantification for Stochastic Porous Media Flows

Reduced Order Model and Uncertainty Quantification for Stochastic Porous Media Flows
Author: Jia Wei
Publisher:
Total Pages:
Release: 2012
Genre:
ISBN:

In this dissertation, we focus on the uncertainty quantification problems where the goal is to sample the porous media properties given integrated responses. We first introduce a reduced order model using the level set method to characterize the channelized features of permeability fields. The sampling process is completed under Bayesian framework. We hence study the regularity of posterior distributions with respect to the prior measures. The stochastic flow equations that contain both spatial and random components must be resolved in order to sample the porous media properties. Some type of upscaling or multiscale technique is needed when solving the flow and transport through heterogeneous porous media. We propose ensemble-level multiscale finite element method and ensemble-level preconditioner technique for solving the stochastic flow equations, when the permeability fields have certain topology features. These methods can be used to accelerate the forward computations in the sampling processes. Additionally, we develop analysis-of-variance-based mixed multiscale finite element method as well as a novel adaptive version. These methods are used to study the forward uncertainty propagation of input random fields. The computational cost is saved since the high dimensional problem is decomposed into lower dimensional problems. We also work on developing efficient advanced Markov Chain Monte Carlo methods. Algorithms are proposed based on the multi-stage Markov Chain Monte Carlo and Stochastic Approximation Monte Carlo methods. The new methods have the ability to search the whole sample space for optimizations. Analysis and detailed numerical results are presented for applications of all the above methods.

Multiscale Simulation and Uncertainty Quantification Techniques for Richards' Equation in Heterogeneous Media

Multiscale Simulation and Uncertainty Quantification Techniques for Richards' Equation in Heterogeneous Media
Author: Seul Ki Kang
Publisher:
Total Pages:
Release: 2012
Genre:
ISBN:

In this dissertation, we develop multiscale finite element methods and uncertainty quantification technique for Richards' equation, a mathematical model to describe fluid flow in unsaturated porous media. Both coarse-level and fine-level numerical computation techniques are presented. To develop an accurate coarse-scale numerical method, we need to construct an effective multiscale map that is able to capture the multiscale features of the large-scale solution without resolving the small scale details. With a careful choice of the coarse spaces for multiscale finite element methods, we can significantly reduce errors. We introduce several methods to construct coarse spaces for multiscale finite element methods. A coarse space based on local spectral problems is also presented. The construction of coarse spaces begins with an initial choice of multiscale basis functions supported in coarse regions. These basis functions are complemented using weighted local spectral eigenfunctions. These newly constructed basis functions can capture the small scale features of the solution within a coarse-grid block and give us an accurate coarse-scale solution. However, it is expensive to compute the local basis functions for each parameter value for a nonlinear equation. To overcome this difficulty, local reduced basis method is discussed, which provides smaller dimension spaces with which to compute the basis functions. Robust solution techniques for Richards' equation at a fine scale are discussed. We construct iterative solvers for Richards' equation, whose number of iterations is independent of the contrast. We employ two-level domain decomposition pre-conditioners to solve linear systems arising in approximation of problems with high contrast. We show that, by using the local spectral coarse space for the preconditioners, the number of iterations for these solvers is independent of the physical properties of the media. Several numerical experiments are given to support the theoretical results. Last, we present numerical methods for uncertainty quantification applications for Richards' equation. Numerical methods combined with stochastic solution techniques are proposed to sample conductivities of porous media given in integrated data. Our proposed algorithm is based on upscaling techniques and the Markov chain Monte Carlo method. Sampling results are presented to prove the efficiency and accuracy of our algorithm.

Distribution-based Framework for Uncertainty Quantification of Flow in Porous Media

Distribution-based Framework for Uncertainty Quantification of Flow in Porous Media
Author: Hyung Jun Yang
Publisher:
Total Pages:
Release: 2022
Genre:
ISBN:

Quantitative predictions of fluid flow and transport in porous media are often compromised by multi-scale heterogeneity and insufficient site characterization. These factors introduce uncertainty on the input and output of physical systems which are generally expressed as partial differential equations (PDEs). The characterization of this predictive uncertainty is typically done with forward propagation of input uncertainty as well as inverse modeling for the dynamic data integration. The main challenges of forward uncertainty propagation arise from the slow convergence of Monte Carlo Simulations (MCS) especially when the goal is to compute the probability distribution which is necessary for risk assessment and decision making under uncertainty. On the other hand, reliable inverse modeling is often hampered by the ill-posedness of the problem, thus the incorporation of geological constraints becomes increasingly important. In the thesis, four significant contributions are made to alleviate these outstanding issues on forward and inverse problems. First, the method of distributions for the steady-state flow problem is developed to yield a full probabilistic description of outputs via probability distribution function (PDF) or cumulative distribution (CDF). The derivation of deterministic equation for CDF relies on stochastic averaging techniques and self-consistent closure approximation which ensures the resulting CDF has the same mean and variance as those computed with moment equations or MCS. We conduct a series of numerical experiments dealing with steady-state two-dimensional flow driven by either a natural hydraulic head gradient or a pumping well. These experiments reveal that the proposed method remains accurate and robust for highly heterogeneous formations with the variance of log conductivity as large as five. For the same accuracy, it is also up to four orders of magnitude faster than MCS with a required degree of confidence. The second contribution of this work is the extension of the distribution-based method to account for uncertainty in the geologic makeup of a subsurface environment and non-stationary cases. Our CDF-RDD framework provides a probabilistic assessment of uncertainty in highly heterogeneous subsurface formations by combining the method of distributions and the random domain decomposition (RDD). Our numerical experiments reveal that the CDF-RDD remains accurate for two-dimensional flow in a porous material composed of two heterogeneous geo-facies, a setting in which the original distribution method fails. For the same accuracy, the CDF-RDD is an order of magnitude faster than MCS. Next, we develop a complete distribution-based method for the probabilistic forecast of two-phase flow in porous media. The CDF equation for travel time is derived within the efficient streamline-based framework to replace the MCS in the previous FROST method. For getting fast and stable results, we employ numerical techniques including pseudo-time integration, flux-limited scheme, and exponential grid spacing. Our CDF-FROST framework uses the results of the method of distributions for travel time as an input of FROST method. The proposed method provides a probability distribution of saturation without using any sampling-based methods. The numerical tests demonstrate that the CDF-FROST shows good accuracy in estimating the probability distributions of both saturation and travel time. For the same accuracy, it is about 5 and 10 times faster than the previous FROST method and naive MCS, respectively. Lastly, we propose a consensus equilibrium (CE) framework to reconstruct the realistic geological model by the inverse modeling of sparse dynamic data. The optimization-based inversion techniques are integrated with recent machine learning-based methods (e.g., variational auto-encoder and convolutional neural network) by the proposed CE algorithm to capture the complicated geological features. The numerical examples verify that the proposed method well preserves the geological realism, and it efficiently quantifies the uncertainty conditioned on dynamic information.

Uncertainty Quantification and Models of Multi-phase Flow in Porous Media

Uncertainty Quantification and Models of Multi-phase Flow in Porous Media
Author: Proper K. Torsu
Publisher:
Total Pages: 88
Release: 2016
Genre: Multiphase flow
ISBN: 9781369094176

This dissertation investigates models of multiphase flow in porous media with the goal of understanding the behavior of classical and novel descriptions of flow, the strengths and shortcoming of each, and establishing numerical solutions for various models to demonstrate their accuracy. Of particular interest are equilibrium and non-equilibrium imbibition models. Our studies have revealed new findings and results which open new avenues of research and applications in the future. With respect to non-equilibrium models, the contributions of this work to existing results include extension of a spontaneous countercurrent imbibition model studied by Silin and Patzek to second order and its capability to accommodate non-constant redistribution time. The study has demonstrated that late time asymptotic solutions do not depend on relaxation time. Moreover, an analysis of the extended model has revealed that recovery scales with square root of time; an important results established by Barenblatt, Ryzhik and Sinlin and Patzek. Another important study in this direction is a decomposition method for solving quasilinear initial boundary value problems, especially transport systems. This study was inspired by Adomian decomposition, a technique for solving nonlinear partial differential equations. One primary limitation of the Adomian decomposition is its inability to solve boundary value problems with zero or constant boundary conditions in general. In this work, the traditional Adomian decomposition method has been extended to quasilinear initial boundary value problems. The method has been applied to several standard problems in engineering and physics. In a slightly different direction, this dissertation also explored several aspects of Uncertainty Quantification of parameters in reservoir engineering. We studied a decomposition method for quantifying uncertainty associated with coefficients reservoir in modeling. This method has been applied to optimization of well placement problems; where it is integrated into a simulator for the transport system. If applicable, the method in general serves as a replacement for Monte Carlo simulations. It has been demonstrated in this dissertation that the decomposition method is substantially more efficient in comparison to the traditional Monte Carlo simulations. It also offers a variety of choices between computational resources, time and accuracy of the approximations.

An Efficient Computational Framework for Uncertainty Quantification in Multiscale Systems

An Efficient Computational Framework for Uncertainty Quantification in Multiscale Systems
Author: Xiang Ma
Publisher:
Total Pages: 224
Release: 2011
Genre:
ISBN:

To accurately predict the performance of physical systems, it becomes essential for one to include the effects of input uncertainties into the model system and understand how they propagate and alter the final solution. The presence of uncertainties can be modeled in the system through reformulation of the governing equations as stochastic partial differential equations (SPDEs). The spectral stochastic finite element method (SSFEM) and stochastic collocation methods are the most popular simulation methods for SPDEs. However, both methods utilize global polynomials in the stochastic space. Thus when there are steep gradients or finite discontinuities in the stochastic space, these methods converge slowly or even fail to converge. In order to resolve the above mentioned issues, an adaptive sparse grid collocation (ASGC) strategy is developed using piecewise multi-linear hierarchical basis functions. Hierarchical surplus is used as an error indicator to automatically detect the discontinuity region in the stochastic space and adaptively refine the collocation points in this region. However, this method is limited to a moderate number of random variables. To address the solution of high-dimensional stochastic problems, a computational methodology is further introduced that utilizes the High Dimensional Model Representation (HDMR) technique in the stochastic space to represent the model output as a finite hierarchical correlated function expansion in terms of the stochastic inputs starting from lower-order to higher-order component functions. An adaptive version of HDMR is also developed to automatically detect the important dimensions and construct higherorder terms using only the important dimensions. The ASGC is integrated with HDMR to solve the resulting sub-problems. Uncertainty quantification for fluid transport in porous media in the presence of both stochastic permeability and multiple scales is addressed using the developed HDMR framework. In order to capture the small scale heterogeneity, a new mixed multiscale finite element method is developed within the framework of the heterogeneous multiscale method in the spatial domain. Several numerical examples are considered to examine the accuracy of the multiscale and stochastic frameworks developed. A summary of suggestions for future research in the area of stochastic multiscale modeling are given at the end of the thesis.