SPH modelling of fluid at the grain level in a porous medium

Computational modelling of the flow of fluids in porous media has traditionally been at a macroscopic level where the medium’s permeability and porosity are an input (from experiments for example). In many cases this is difficult, especially if the porous medium changes its solid structure as a function of time. This situation occurs in reactive systems such as “heap-leaching”, where biological and/or chemical solutions are introduced into the heap to dissolve or react with valuable materials. In this case, modelling fluid flow at the grain level is paramount and we show how this can be done with the SPH technique. We present three-dimensional SPH simulations of fluid flow in an idealised porous medium and show that the technique yields flows which are physically realistic. The permeability of the medium is then predicted.