Spatial and temporal features of dense contaminant transport: experimental investigation and numerical modeling

Abstract

We investigate the spatial and temporal features of dense contaminant plumes dynamics in porous materials. Our analysis is supported by novel experimental results concerning pollutant concentration profiles inside a vertical column setup. We describe the experimental methods and elucidate the salient outcomes of the measurements, with focus on miscible fluids in homogeneous saturated media. By resorting to a finite elements approach, we numerically solve the equations that rule the pollutants migration and compare the simulation results with the experimental data. Finally, we qualitatively explore the interfacial dynamics behavior between the dense contaminant plume and the lighter resident fluid that saturates the column.