Boundary and Inertia Effects on Flow and Heat Transfer in Porous Media

The present work analyzes the effects of a solid boundary and the inertial forces on flow and heat transfer in porous media. Specific attention is given to flow through a porous medium in the vicinity of an impermeable boundary. The local volume-averaging technique has been utilized to establish the governing equations, along with an indication of physical limitations and assumptions made in the course of this development. A numerical scheme for the governing equations has been developed to investigate the velocity and temperature fields inside a porous medium near an impermeable boundary, and a new concept of the momentum boundary layer central to the numerical routine is presented. The boundary and inertial effects are characterized in terms of three dimensionless groups, and these effects are shown to be more pronounced in highly permeable media, high Prandtl-num~r fluids, large pressure gradients, and in the region close to the leading edge of the flow boundary layer.