Abstract
The use of effective-medium treatments to estimate bulk properties pertaining to transport (of, for example, fluids, heat, particles or electricity) through random composite media (such as reservoir rocks), is widespread. This is because they are relatively simple, often reasonably accurate (on occasion, remarkably so) and in many cases yield closed-form expressions for the properties concerned. However, the single-bond effective-medium treatment (EMT) of random resistor networks that has been used to determine transport coefficients for various transport problems in pore networks is limited to some special isotropic networks with nearest-neighbour connections. We demonstrate here that transport through two different fracture system models, with stress-induced anisotropy, can be treated using an EMT originally applied to anisotropic resistor networks. The main purpose of the present contribution, however, is to present a new, more general effective medium formalism applicable to networks of arbitrary topology. This new generalised EMT is used to obtain a new criterion for percolation of an arbitrary conducting network under random dilution. A specific application to unsaturated flow through a pore network with nearest- and next-nearest-neighbour connections is also given.
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Harris, C.K. Application of generalised effective-medium theory to transport in porous media. Transp Porous Med 5, 517–542 (1990). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01403480
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01403480