CONTAMINANT TRANSPORT IN NONISOTHERMAL FRACTURED POROUS-MEDIA

Alternative formulations of the analytical modeling for contaminant tr ansport in nonisothermal fractured porous media are presented. Transie nt and steady heat flows are coupled with solute transport, either imp licitly as natural convection incorporating the effect of thermal flux on the variation of concentration gradients, or explicitly as a ''Sor et effect,'' where the divergence of the thermal flux acts as an addit ional source term affecting the change of solute concentration. The ef fect of solid deformation due to temperature changes and subsequent im pact on the variation of solute concentrations are identified. The pro position of using function transformation within Laplace space may be of significance for numerical implementation in solving advection-disp ersion equations. Two different dual-porosity conceptualizations of fr actured porous media are proposed based on alternative assumptions of matrix flow. The concept of ''matrix replenishment'' in relation to th e traditional ''matrix diffusion'' is presented, which may have practi cal significance in the evaluation of contaminant transport in fractur ed porous media. The solutions are applicable for modeling the process using thermal sweeping to remediate contaminated areas.