New equations for binary gas transport in porous media, Part 1: equation development

A rigorous understanding of the mass and momentum conservation equations for gas transport in porous media is vital for many environmental and industrial applications. We utilize the method of volume averaging to derive Darcy-scale, closure-level coupled equations for mass and momentum conservation. The up-scaled expressions for both the gas-phase advective velocity and the mass transport contain novel terms which may be significant under flow regimes of environmental significance. New terms in the velocity expression arise from the inclusion of a slip boundary condition and closure-level coupling to the mass transport equation. A new term in the mass conservation equation, due to the closure-level coupling, may significantly affect advective transport. Order of magnitude estimates based on the closure equations indicate that one or more of these new terms will be significant in many cases of gas flow in porous media. (C) 2003 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.