Chaparro Sánchez, Maria Carme

Saaltink, Maarten Willem

Villar, M.V.

English

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Geophysical Research AbstractsVol. 15, EGU2013-5781, 2013EGU General Assembly 2013© Author(s) 2013. CC Attribution 3.0 License.Modelling of multiphase flow in evaporation tests in concrete columnsM.Carme Chaparro (1), Maarten W. Saaltink (1), and M.Victoria Villar (2)(1) GHS, Dept. Geotechnical Engineering and Geosciences, Technical University of Catalonia (UPC-BarcelonaTech),Barcelona, Spain (m.carme.chaparro@upc.edu, maarten.saaltink@upc.edu), (2) CIEMAT, Centro de InvestigacionesEnergéticas, Medioambientales y Tecnológicas, Madrid, Spain (mv.villar@ciemat.es)In order to characterize better the thermo-hydraulic properties and processes in concrete from a Radioactive WasteDisposal Facility at El Cabril (Spain), evaporation tests in columns have been analysed by means of numericalmodels. The tests consisted of letting water evaporate from the top of the column while monitoring water loss byweighing the column, and monitoring temperature and relative humidity by means of sensors placed within thecolumn. Both non-isothermal (by heating the column with a lamp) and isothermal tests (without heating) wereperformed.The conceptual model considers unsaturated liquid flow and transport of vapour and heat. Some modelsalso take into account the salinity in order to study its effect on vapour pressure and evaporation. A retentioncurve has been obtained from relative humidity and gravimetric water content measured after dismantling thecolumns. The models have been calibrated by fitting permeability and a tortuosity factor for vapour diffusion tothe measured water loss, relative humidity and (in the case of the non-isothermal test) temperature.Results show that vapour diffusion is dominant above an evaporation front, and liquid advection is thedominant water transport process underneath this front. The salinity slightly reduces the evaporation with a factorof at most 5%. The tortuosity factor estimated from the isothermal test is lower than that of the non-isothermaltest. This can be explained by the evaporation and condensation together with the heat transport that take place atpore scale under non-isothermal conditions, which are not taken into account by the model.

Modelling of multiphase flow in evaporation tests in concrete columns

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Modelling of multiphase flow in evaporation tests in concrete columns

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