Heat transfer of large Prandtl number fluids in porous media by a new lattice Boltzmann model

Abstract

With the fast development of sustainable energy technologies and the extreme urgency to protect the living environment, it is crucial to deepen our understanding on the heat transfer characteristics of natural convection of large Prandtl number fluids in porous media. In this study a novel lattice Boltzmann approach is developed as a powerful numerical tool to close the knowledge gap on this important topic. With the aid of this new numerical tool, four new findings are reported and they show that the heat transfer characteristics and correlations of natural convection of large Prandtl number fluids in porous media are quite different from their small Prandtl number counterparts. Through the present analysis, it is found that such inconsistences result from that a transition from a convection-dominated heat transfer process to a conduction-dominated one will appear more easily for large Prandtl number fluids in porous media.