Depth-averaged and 3D Finite Volume numerical models for viscous fluids, with application to the simulation of lava flows
Creators: name: BIAGIOLI, ELISA
Publisher: name: Universit� degli studi di Genova
Year: 2021

description: This Ph.D. project was initially born from the motivation to contribute to the depth-averaged and 3D modeling of lava flows. Still, we can frame the work done in a broader and more generalist vision. We developed two models that may be used for generic viscous fluids, and we applied efficient numerical schemes for both cases, as explained in the following.

The new solvers simulate free-surface viscous fluids whose temperature changes are due to radiative, convective, and conductive heat exchanges. A temperature-dependent viscoplastic model is used for the final application to lava flows. Both the models behind the solvers were derived from mass, momentum, and energy conservation laws. Still, one was obtained by following the depth-averaged model approach and the other by the 3D model approach. The numerical schemes adopted in both our models belong to the family of finite volume methods, based on the integral form of the conservation laws. This choice of methods family is fundamental because it allows the creation and propagation of discontinuities in the solutions and enforces the conservation properties of the equations. 

We propose a depth-averaged model for a viscous fluid in an incompressible and laminar regime with an additional transport equation for a scalar quantity varying horizontally and a variable density that depends on such transported quantity. Viscosity and non-constant vertical profiles for the velocity and the transported quantity are assumed, overtaking the classic shallow-water formulation. The classic formulation bases on several assumptions, such as the fact that the vertical pressure distribution is hydrostatic, that the vertical component of the velocity can be neglected, and that the horizontal velocity field can be considered constant with depth because the classic formulation accounts for non-viscous fluids. When the vertical shear is essential, the last assumption is too restrictive, so it must relax, producing a modified momentum equation in which a coefficient, known as the Boussinesq factor, appears in the advective term. The spatial discretization method we employed is a modified version of the central-upwind scheme introduced by Kurganov and Petrova in 2007 for the classical shallow water equations. This method is based on a semi-discretization of the computational domain, is stable, and, being a high-order method, has a low numerical diffusion. For the temporal discretization, we used an implicit-explicit Runge-Kutta technique discussed by Russo in 2005 that permits an implicit treatment of the stiff terms. The whole scheme is proved to preserve the positivity of flow thickness and the stationary steady-states. Several numerical experiments validate the proposed method, show the incidence on the numerical solutions of shape coefficients introduced in the model and present the effects of the viscosity-related parameters on the final emplacement of a lava flow.

Our 3D model describes the dynamics of two incompressible, viscous, and immiscible fluids, possibly belonging to different phases. Being interested in the final application of lava flows, we also have an equation for energy that models the thermal exchanges between the fluid and the environment. We implemented this model in OpenFOAM, which employs a segregated strategy and the Finite Volume Methods to solve the equations. The Volume of Fluid (VoF) technique introduced by Hirt and Nichols in 1981 is used to deal with the multiphase dynamics (based on the Interphase Capturing strategy), and hence a new transport equation for the volume fraction of one phase is added. The challenging effort of maintaining an accurate description of the interphase between fluids is solved by using the Multidimensional Universal Limiter for Explicit Solution (MULES) method (described by Marquez Damian in 2013) that implements the Flux-Corrected Transport (FCT) technique introduced by Boris and Book in 1973, proposing a mix of high and low order schemes. The choice of the framework to use for any new numerical code is crucial.
Our contribution consists of creating a new solver called interThermalRadConvFoam in the OpenFOAM framework by modifying the already existing solver interFoam (described by Deshpande et al. in 2012). Finally, we compared the results of our simulations with some benchmarks to evaluate the performances of our model.