Modeling Free Product Migration and Recovery at Hydrocarbon Spill Sites

Abstract

AbstractThe numerical model ARMOS, which simulates areal flow of water and light hydrocarbon in an unconiined aquifer, isdescribed. Based on the assumption of local vertical equilibrium, area! flow equations for water and hydrocarbon are derived which exhibit reduced dimensionality and nonlinearity. A finite‐element method is used to solve the water and oil equations using an efficient semidecoupled approach. Input required by the model includes area! boundaries, elevations of the aquifer lower boundary, and initial water and hydrocarbon levels in monitoring wells. Soil and fluid properties include hydrocarbon density, viscosity and surface tension, saturated hydraulic conductivity, van Genuchten air‐water capillary pressure curve parameters, and the maximum residual hydrocarbon saturations in the saturated and unsaturated zones. Fluid heads or fluxes may be specified on the domain perimeter and pumping rates are prescribed at recovery wells. The water pumping rate is automatically limited when drawdown reaches a pump‐off set point (or the screen bottom), and hydrocarbon recovery is limited when well hydrocarbon thickness becomes zero. Model output includes water and hydrocarbon levels in monitoring wells, cumulative product recovery, and free and residual hydrocarbon volumes in the soil. A hypothetical problem involving optimization of free product recovery and a field application of the model to a large pipeline leak are described.