67 research outputs found
Large-scale physically accurate modelling of real proton exchange membrane fuel cell with deep learning
Proton exchange membrane fuel cells, consuming hydrogen and oxygen to generate clean electricity and water, suffer acute liquid water challenges. Accurate liquid water modelling is inherently challenging due to the multi-phase, multi-component, reactive dynamics within multi-scale, multi-layered porous media. In addition, currently inadequate imaging and modelling capabilities are limiting simulations to small areas (<1 mm2) or simplified architectures. Herein, an advancement in water modelling is achieved using X-ray micro-computed tomography, deep learned super-resolution, multi-label segmentation, and direct multi-phase simulation. The resulting image is the most resolved domain (16 mm2 with 700 nm voxel resolution) and the largest direct multi-phase flow simulation of a fuel cell. This generalisable approach unveils multi-scale water clustering and transport mechanisms over large dry and flooded areas in the gas diffusion layer and flow fields, paving the way for next generation proton exchange membrane fuel cells with optimised structures and wettabilities
Pore-scale modeling of two-phase flow: a comparison of the generalized network model to direct numerical simulation
Despite recent advances in pore-scale modeling of two-phase flow through porous media, the relative strengths and limitations of various modeling approaches have been largely unexplored. In this work, two-phase flow simulations from the generalized network model (GNM) [Phys. Rev. E 96, 013312 (2017)2470-004510.1103/PhysRevE.96.013312; Phys. Rev. E 97, 023308 (2018)2470-004510.1103/PhysRevE.97.023308] are compared with a recently developed lattice-Boltzmann model (LBM) [Adv. Water Resour. 116, 56 (2018)0309-170810.1016/j.advwatres.2018.03.014; J. Colloid Interface Sci. 576, 486 (2020)0021-979710.1016/j.jcis.2020.03.074] for drainage and waterflooding in two samples-a synthetic beadpack and a micro-CT imaged Bentheimer sandstone-under water-wet, mixed-wet, and oil-wet conditions. Macroscopic capillary pressure analysis reveals good agreement between the two models, and with experiments, at intermediate saturations but shows large discrepancy at the end-points. At a resolution of 10 grid blocks per average throat, the LBM is unable to capture the effect of layer flow which manifests as abnormally large initial water and residual oil saturations. Critically, pore-by-pore analysis shows that the absence of layer flow limits displacement to invasion-percolation in mixed-wet systems. The GNM is able to capture the effect of layers, and exhibits predictions closer to experimental observations in water and mixed-wet Bentheimer sandstones. Overall, a workflow for the comparison of pore-network models with direct numerical simulation of multiphase flow is presented. The GNM is shown to be an attractive option for cost and time-effective predictions of two-phase flow, and the importance of small-scale flow features in the accurate representation of pore-scale physics is highlighted
On the consistency of scale among experiments, theory, and simulation
As a tool for addressing problems of scale, we consider an evolving approach known as the thermodynamically constrained averaging theory (TCAT), which has broad applicability to hydrology. We consider the case of modeling of two-fluid-phase flow in porous media, and we focus on issues of scale as they relate to various measures of pressure, capillary pressure, and state equations needed to produce solvable models. We apply TCAT to perform physics-based data assimilation to understand how the internal behavior influences the macroscale state of two-fluid porous medium systems. A microfluidic experimental method and a lattice Boltzmann simulation method are used to examine a key deficiency associated with standard approaches. In a hydrologic process such as evaporation, the water content will ultimately be reduced below the irreducible wetting-phase saturation determined from experiments. This is problematic since the derived closure relationships cannot predict the associated capillary pressures for these states. We demonstrate that the irreducible wetting-phase saturation is an artifact of the experimental design, caused by the fact that the boundary pressure difference does not approximate the true capillary pressure. Using averaging methods, we compute the true capillary pressure for fluid configurations at and below the irreducible wetting-phase saturation. Results of our analysis include a state function for the capillary pressure expressed as a function of fluid saturation and interfacial area
Accuracy and performance of the lattice Boltzmann method with 64-bit, 32-bit, and customized 16-bit number formats
Fluid dynamics simulations with the lattice Boltzmann method (LBM) are very
memory-intensive. Alongside reduction in memory footprint, significant
performance benefits can be achieved by using FP32 (single) precision compared
to FP64 (double) precision, especially on GPUs. Here, we evaluate the
possibility to use even FP16 and Posit16 (half) precision for storing fluid
populations, while still carrying arithmetic operations in FP32. For this, we
first show that the commonly occurring number range in the LBM is a lot smaller
than the FP16 number range. Based on this observation, we develop novel 16-bit
formats - based on a modified IEEE-754 and on a modified Posit standard - that
are specifically tailored to the needs of the LBM. We then carry out an
in-depth characterization of LBM accuracy for six different test systems with
increasing complexity: Poiseuille flow, Taylor-Green vortices, Karman vortex
streets, lid-driven cavity, a microcapsule in shear flow (utilizing the
immersed-boundary method) and finally the impact of a raindrop (based on a
Volume-of-Fluid approach). We find that the difference in accuracy between FP64
and FP32 is negligible in almost all cases, and that for a large number of
cases even 16-bit is sufficient. Finally, we provide a detailed performance
analysis of all precision levels on a large number of hardware
microarchitectures and show that significant speedup is achieved with mixed
FP32/16-bit.Comment: 30 pages, 20 figures, 4 tables, 2 code listing
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