Application of Stochastic Fracture Network with Numerical Fluid Flow Simulations to Groundwater Flow Modeling in Fractured Rocks

The continuum approach in fluid flow modeling is generally applied to porous geological media, but has limited applicability to fractured rocks. With the presence of a discrete fracture network relatively sparsely distributed in the matrix, it may be difficult or erroneous to use a porous medium fluid flow model with continuum assumptions to describe the fluid flow in fractured rocks at small or even large field scales. A discrete fracture fluid flow approach incorporating a stochastic fracture network with numerical fluid flow simulations could have the capability of capturing fluid flow behaviors such as inhomogeneity and anisotropy while reflecting the changes of hydraulic features at different scales. Moreover, this approach can be implemented to estimate the size of the representative elementary volume (REV) in order to find out the scales at which a porous medium flow model could be applied, and then to determine the hydraulic conductivity tensor for fractured rocks. The following topics are focused on in this study: (a) conceptual discrete fracture fluid flow modeling incorporating a stochastic fracture network with numerical flow simulations; (b) estimation of REV and hydraulic conductivity tensor for fractured rocks utilizing a stochastic fracture network with numerical fluid flow simulations; (c) investigation of the effect of fracture orientation and density on the hydraulic conductivity and REV by implementing a stochastic fracture network with numerical fluid flow simulations, and (d) fluid flow conceptual models accounting for major and minor fractures in the 2 D or 3 D flow fields incorporating a stochastic fracture network with numerical fluid flow simulations.