Testing of NAPL simulator to predict migration of a light nonaqueous phase liquid(LNAPL) under water table fluctuation in a sandy medium

Nanoqueous phase liquid(NAPL) simulator is a powerful and popular mathematical model for modeling the flow and transport of non-aqueous phase liquids in subsurface,but the testing of its feasibility under water table fluctuation has received insufficient attention.The feature in a column test was tested through two cycles of water table fluctuation.The sandy medium in the column was initially saturated,and each cycle of water table fluctuation consisted of one water table falling and one rising,resulting in a drainage and an imbibition of the medium,respectively.It was found that the difference between the simulated and measured results in the first drainage of the column test was minor.However,with the propagation of the water table fluctuations,the simulation errors increased,and the simulation accuracy was not acceptable except for the first drainage in the two fluctuation cycles.The main reason was proved to be the estimation method of residual saturation used in this simulator.Also,based on the column tests,it was assumed that the resulting residual saturation from an incomplete imbibition process was a constant,with a value equal to that of the residual value resulting from the main imbibition process.The results obtained after modifying NAPL simulator with this assumption were found to be more accurate in the first cycle of water table fluctuation,but this accuracy decreased rapidly in the second one.It is concluded that NAPL simulator is not adequate in the case of LNAPL migration under water table fluctuation in sandy medium,unless a feasible assumption to estimate residual saturation is put forward.

New measurements on hydrodynamics in a gas-liquid-solid expanded bed

The solid holdup,in a 150 mm-ID×2460 mm-height gas-liquid-solid expanded bed with air,water and glass beads(the diameter of particles is 0.6-0.8 mm)was firstly investigated based on the immersion-type online multiphase measuring instrument,and bubble behavior was studied via the BVW-2 double electrical conductivity probe.The effect of the superficial gas velocity and liquid velocity on the expanded ratio,the transition ratio,the bubble rising velocity,the gas holdup and the solid holdup was studied.It is discovered that compared with the gas velocity,the liquid velocity has stronger impact on the expanded ratio,but it is opposite for the transition ratio.The average gas holdup and solid holdup increase linearly as the superficial gas velocity goes up.Among it,the gas holdup increases greater in the center,while the solid holdup increases greater near the wall.Compared with it,when the superficial liquid velocity rises,the average gas holdup hardly changes,but the average solid holdup keeps decreasing,especially the solid holdup distributes flatter with the increase of the superficial liquid velocity.