Rock Engineering in Difficult Ground Conditions Soft Rocks and Karst Vrkljan (ed)

2010 Taylor & Francis Group, London, ISBN 978-0-415-80481-3

Effect of surface roughness on velocity fields through rock fractures

M. Sarifzadeh, M. Javadi & K. Shahriar
Faculty of Mining & Metallurgical Engineering, Amirkabir University of Technology, Tehran, Iran

M. Mehrjooei
Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Amirkabir University of Technology, Tehran, Iran

ABSTRACT: In many geological structures, the matrix permeability is negligible and the fractures are
the main flow paths. The fluid flow and particle transport through rock fracture are increasingly important research topics mainly to the demands for design, operation and safety assessments of underground/
surface constructions. In this paper, turbulent flow through an artificial three-dimensional rock fracture
has been simulated by using finite volume method for a wide range of inlet velocities. The average velocity on several horizontal and vertical sections were calculated and normalized with inlet velocities. These
normalized velocities have been used to illustrate roughness effect on flow velocity fields in rock fractures.
The results show that; (i) by increasing flow rate, the symmetry of velocity profile decreases and incline
to the smoothest fracture surface, also the intensity of rotational flow increases and, (ii) in high flow
rates, the arrangement of flow channels changes and lower flow rates take place through large apertures.
1

INTRODUCTION

Fluid flow and solute transport in a fractured

rock mass are of keys interest for many practical
applications such as in the hydrocarbon and water
industries and in the safe design of disposal sites
for domestic, industrial and nuclear wastes. In
many geological structures, rock fractures are the
main flow paths and introduce as a most important attribute in rock mass hydraulic behavior.
Therefore, the development of robust predictive
models of flow and transport requires a thorough
understanding of the physical processes that govern flow in individual fractures.
Traditionally, single fractures have been idealized as a set of parallel plates in order to obtain
a tractable mathematical description of fluid flow,
namely, the cubic law (Witherspoon et al., 1980).
However, it is now well established in the literature
that single fractures are rough-walled conduits
with variable aperture and the classical view of a
rock fracture as a pair of smooth, parallel plates
is not adequate for the description of flow. In
order to deal with the variations of the aperture,
the Reynolds lubrication equation (Brown 1987)
was introduced as an alternative approximation to
the considerably more computationally intensive
solution of the Navier-Stokes (NS) equations. This
approximation is just valid for laminar flow through
fractures and needs some especial geometrical and
kinematical conditions of fracture and fluid flow

respectively (Zimmerman & Bodvarsson 1996, Ge

1997). The Reynolds lubrication equation ignores
local velocity components that are perpendicular
to the nominal fracture plane and the fluid velocity is assumed to be parabolic across the fracture
aperture (Sisavath et al., 2003, Brush & Thomson
2003). Therefore, in recent studies, direct numerical
simulation of NS equations is used for investigation of fluid flow through fractures (Zimmerman
et al., 2004, Brush & Thomson 2003, Koyama et al.,
2008, Nazridoust et al., 2006). Several researchers
evaluated the behavior of fluid flow through roughwalled fractures, experimentally (Qian et al., 2005,
Sharifzadeh 2005) or numerically (Javadi et al., in
press, Brush & Thomson 2003, Zimmerman et al.,
2004) all of which indicate that the effect of nonlinear flow becomes more evident in highest values of Reynolds number. Moreover, the dispersion
of a passive tracer flowing through a fracture is
governed by the velocity profile across the fracture
aperture and heterogeneities of the velocity field
in relation with the macroscopic variation of the
aperture (Loggia et al., 2004). Therefore, the representations of the complete velocity fields within
the fracture and across the aperture are required.
Zimmerman et al. (2004) studied non-linear and
flow regimes both with experimental and numerical solving of NS equations. They showed that
the effect of non-linear behavior of flow becomes
more evident by increasing Reynolds numbers and
suggested the critical Reynolds number of 10 for

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practical purposes. However, few studies have been

implemented on the numerical simulation of
NS equations for turbulent flow through threedimensional rock fractures.
The objective of this paper is to examine the
impacts of fracture roughness on the flow velocity
fields. In present study, first a three-dimensional
geometrical domain of a hypothetical rough-walled
fracture was generated. Computational domain
of this fracture was generated and turbulent flow
through the void specimen was simulated by using
finite volume method for a wide range of inlet
velocities. The average velocity on several horizontal and vertical sections have been calculated and
normalized with inlet velocity. These normalized
velocities were used to illustrate roughness effect
on flow velocity fields in rock fractures.

The numerical solution of the NS equations

for turbulent flow is extremely difficult, and due
to the significantly different mixing-length scales
that are involved in turbulent flow, the stable solution of this requires such a fine mesh resolution
that the computation time becomes significantly
long. Attempts to solve turbulent flow using a
laminar solver typically result in a time-unsteady
solution, which fails to converge appropriately. To
encounter this, a time-averaged equation, RANS,
supplemented with k turbulence model was used
in practical computational fluid dynamics applications when modeling turbulent flow. In this study,
the FLUENTTM code was used for turbulent flow
simulation.

A three-dimensional geometrical domain of

an arbitrary fracture with 3 mm in width and
12.5 mm in length, in x- and y-directions respectively, has been used for fluid flow simulation. For
evaluating the impacts of surface roughness and
aperture on fluid flow through void specimen, the
lower and upper walls of the fracture (Fig. 1a)
were applied as a smooth and very rough surface,
respectively. Three- dimensional void space has
been generated over an xy grid with uniform
spacing x and y (equal to 0.5 mm), and variable aperture (z).
The fracture geometrical domain consisted of
150 volumetric elements (6 rows and 25 columns).
Each volumetric elements height, in z-direction,
represents the aperture. As shown in Figure 1b,
the aperture of fracture varies from a minimum
of 0.35 mm to a maximum of 0.65 mm and its
average and standard deviation are 0.485 mm and
0.106 mm, respectively.
Computational grids of about 890,000 tetrahedral meshes were generated using GAMBITTM
preprocessor code. The numerical simulations
have been performed for water with a density of
998.2 kg/m3 and a viscosity of 0.001 kg/ms and
the gravitational effect was neglected. The velocity inlet boundary condition was used for the
inlet region of the domain. The inlet velocity was
considered to distribute uniformly in y-direction
and low turbulence intensity (1%) was assumed in
all numerical turbulent flow simulations. For the
outlet of the domain, an outflow boundary condition was assumed. All other solid surfaces of the
domain (boundaries of the fracture) were defined
as impermeable walls with the no-slip velocity
boundary condition (Fig. 1a). Flow simulations
through three-dimensional fracture were performed within a range of inlet velocity from 0.01
to 1 m/s.

METHODOLOGY

2.1 Governing equations

The general description of fluid flow in a single
fracture is given by the NS equations which express
momentum and mass conservation over the fracture
void space. Considering the steady laminar flow of
a Newtonian fluid with constant density and viscosity through a fracture with impermeable walls,
the NS equations may be written in vector form as

( u ) u = 2 u p

(1)

where is the fluid density, is the fluid viscosity,

u is the flow velocity vector, and p is the hydrodynamic pressure. In order to have a closed system of
equations, they must be supplemented by the continuity equation, which represents conservation of
mass. For an incompressible fluid, conservation of
mass is equivalent to conservation of volume, and
the equation takes the form
u = 0

(2)

The relevant boundary conditions for the NS

equations include the no-slip conditions, which
specify that at any boundary between the fluid and
a solid, the velocity vector of the fluid must equal
that of the solid (Zimmerman & Bodvarsson,
1996).
2.2 Numerical simulation
Finite volume method has been employed to solve
the NS equations (Eq. (1)) and continuity equation
(Eq. (2)) for a three-dimensional problem. The
Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) equations was used for turbulent flow simulation.

2.3 Computational domain and Boundary

conditions

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Figure 1. Geometrical domain of the hypothetical

fracture which used for fluid flow simulation: (a) threedimensional geometrical domain with boundary conditions and (b) frequency of aperture.

SIMULATION RESULTS

Four horizontal sections with heights of z = 200 m

(I), 300 m (II), 425 m (III) and 525 m (IV),
were selected through geometrical domain. The
evolution of y-component of the flow velocity
vector (Hereafter, expressed velocity will represent the y-component of velocity vector) for three
inlet velocity of 0.01, 0.2 and 1 m/s, were shown in
Figure 2ac, respectively.
The white rectangular regions on Sections III
and IV in Figure 2 show the zones that intersected
with upper surface of fracture. For inlet velocity
of 0.01 m/s, the flow channeling can be observed
in all horizontal sections especially for Section II
(Fig. 2a). The fluid flow occurs predominantly in
a few preferred paths, which contain the largest
apertures with the smallest aperture change. Also
several areas with large apertures exist on Sections
I and II in Figure 2a that have low flow velocity.
Theses results show that, areas with large apertures do not necessarily have large flow because
they may be isolated from the main flow paths by
constrictions around them. By increasing inlet
velocity (Fig. 2), the absolute ratio between maximum and minimum values of velocity decreases
from 15.2 to 4.87 for the inlet velocity of 0.01 m/s to

Figure 2. The evolution of flow velocity field predicted

by turbulent flow simulation along horizontal sections:
z = 200 m (I), 300 m (II), 425 m (III) and 525 m
(IV) for inlet velocities of (a) 0.01 m/s (b) 0.2 m/s and
(c) 1 m/s. The values indicate the y-component of the
flow velocity vector (m/s).

1 m/s, respectively. Several regions on Sections IV in

Figure 2 have the negative values of velocity, which
indicates that rotational flow was introduced in

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these regions and in this situations mass transferring

occurs in the opposite direction to the main flow.
By increasing inlet velocity, the intensity of
rotational flow increases as the absolute ratio
between minimum value of velocity to inlet velocity increases from 0.015 to 0.328 for inlet velocity
of 0.01 m/s to 1 m/s, respectively.
In order to evaluate the effect of surface roughness on the average flow velocity, sixty-four horizontal sections with 0.01 mm consecutive distances
in z-direction were considered through geometrical
domain. For each inlet velocity, the average flow
velocity on the horizontal sections (Vh) were calculated and then normalized by inlet velocity (Vinlet).
Figure 3 shows the variations of the normalized
average velocity on the horizontal sections for different inlet velocities and the elevation of sections.
The maximum value of the normalized velocity
(1.47) occurred in inlet velocity of 0.01 m /s that is
closed to ideal magnitude for cubic law.
By increasing inlet velocity, the maximum value
of the normalized velocity decreases from 1.47
to 1.34 for the inlet velocity of 0.01 m/s to 1 m/s,
respectively. On the other hand, by increasing inlet
velocity, the corresponding height of the maximum value of the normalized velocity decreases
from 0.205 mm to 0.18 mm for the inlet velocity of
0.01 m/s to 1 m/s, respectively. This means that the
symmetry of velocity profile decrease and incline
to the smoothest fracture surface (Fig. 3).
As presented above, the lower fracture wall is
smooth and the upper one is very rough surface
and two different kinds of normalized velocity variations can be seen near fracture walls.
Figure 5 shows more clearly the variations of the
normalized average velocity on the horizontal
sections along the z-direction. On the horizontal sections that are located near lower surface
(hereafter named NL horizontal sections), by
increasing inlet velocity, the normalized velocity
increases non-linearly. Also, the rate of variation
of normalized velocity on NL horizontal sections

Figure 3. Variations of the normalized average velocity

on the horizontal sections for different inlet velocities.

decreases with increasing of inlet velocity. The normalized velocity of NL horizontal sections with
elevation from 0.005 mm to 0.035 mm increases
roughly linear with increasing the elevation of sections and the corresponding curves are approximately parallel to each other (Fig. 4a).
The normalized velocity between NL horizontal
sections with elevation of 0.035 mm and 0.045 mm
increases abruptly, which can be seen for all inlet
velocities. This variation in normalized velocity
may be induced by viscosity effect and referred to
the boundary layer which occurred near the lower
fracture wall.
Horizontal sections that are located near upper
surface (hereafter named UL horizontal sections)
shows different variations of the normalized
velocity. By increasing inlet velocity, the normalized velocity on UL horizontal sections decreases
non-linearly. The rate of variation of normalized
velocity on UL horizontal sections decreases with
increasing of inlet velocity as the magnitude of
normalized velocity for UL horizontal section with
elevation of 0.625 mm becomes negative (Fig. 4b).
This phenomenon indicates that the intensity
of rotational flow increases with increasing of

Figure 4. Variations of the normalized average velocity on the horizontal sections along the z-direction for
(a) NL horizontal sections and (b) UL horizontal
sections.

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inlet velocity and the reverse flow becomes more

intense.
Eleven vertical sections, normal to y-direction
and perpendicular to the main flow direction, with
1 mm consecutive distances in y-direction in the
situations of y = 1.25, 2.25, , 11.25 were selected
through geometrical domain. Each vertical section
can be discretized to six fracture segments with
constant aperture in x-direction. For each inlet
velocity, the average flow velocity on each fracture
segment (Vsegment) was calculated and then normalized by the corresponding average velocity on vertical section (Vvertical).
In order to evaluate the effect of aperture on
variations of the normalized velocity of fracture
segments, the aperture magnitudes (aseg) are normalized by the average aperture of corresponding
vertical section (av). Figure 5 shows the variations
of the normalized velocity of fracture segments for
different normalized aperture.
For inlet velocity of 0.01 m/s, the normalized
velocity magnitudes of fracture segments have a
wide scattering range and change from the minimum

of 0.54 to maximum of 1.47. By increasing inlet

velocity, the scattering range of normalized velocity becomes narrower as the minimum of 0.58 to
maximum of 1.37 for inlet velocity of 1 m/s. moreover, a new arrangement of normalized velocity
distribution can be found, which indicates that at
high values of inlet velocity the normalized velocity
decreases by increasing the normalized aperture.
In order to compare more closely and clearly
about the local behavior of flow velocity, three
sections with distances from inlet area of
y = 1.25 mm (V), 6.25 mm (VI) and 10.25 mm (VII),
were selected from proposed vertical sections. The
variations of the normalized velocity of fracture
segments for different inlet velocities are shown in
Figure 6.
By increasing inlet velocity, the difference
between normalized velocity of fracture segments
with aperture of 0.35 mm in Section V (Fig. 6a)
decreases and the normalized velocities approach
to 1.05. Also, by increasing inlet velocity the normalized velocity of fracture segments with aperture of 0.45 mm and 0.55 mm has a falling form.

Figure 5. The scattering of normalized velocity of fracture segments for inlet velocities of (a) 0.01 m/s (b) 0.2 m/s
and (c) 1 m/s.

Figure 6. The normalized velocity of fracture segments

at vertical sections with distances from inlet area of
(a) 1.25 mm (b) 6.25 mm and (c) 10.25 mm.

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The fracture segment with aperture of 0.55 mm

shows the minimum normalized velocity of 0.87
for inlet velocity of 1 m/s.
The fracture segments can be categorized as
two groups of lateral fracture segments (the fracture segments with center with coordinate of
xc = 0.25 mm and xc = 2.75 mm) and interior
fracture segments (all fracture segments except
the lateral fracture segments). For inlet velocity of
more than 0.2 m/s, by increasing the aperture of
interior fracture segment, the normalized velocity
decreases as the maximum normalized velocity can
be seen for the fracture segment with the aperture
of 0.35 mm and the minimum normalized velocity
takes place in the fracture segment with the largest
aperture. These phenomena can be seen in all vertical sections in Figure 6.
4

DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION

In this paper, the effect of surface roughness on

velocity fields through rock fractures was studied. Computational domain for an artificial threedimensional fracture with one rough surface was
generated and turbulent flow through the void specimen was simulated by using finite volume method
for a wide range of inlet velocities. The results of
turbulent flow simulation were used for evaluating
the impact of roughness and aperture variations on
velocity fields through rock fractures. To reach this
goal, the average normalized velocities on several
horizontal and vertical sections were calculated and
used for describing the roughness effects.
In order to evaluate the impacts of surface
roughness and aperture on fluid flow through void
specimen, the lower and upper surfaces of the used
geometrical domain were applied as a smooth and
very rough surface, respectively. But, both surfaces
of natural fractures are rough and therefore for
more accurate results, both surfaces of geometrical domain should be considered as rough surfaces.
Also, due to the computation constraint, all of these
simulations were considered as small scale, having
been implemented on geometrical domain of several millimeters in length and the effect of largescale roughness remain to be fully investigated.
Simulation results show the non-linear variation of the static pressure drop for different
Reynolds number in the range of 4.5 to 450. The
non-linearity of fluid flow implies the turbulency
on fluid and therefore, it seems that the turbulent
flow simulation leads to more rational and reasonable estimations. Inertial effects are manifested
wherever high spatial accelerations within the
flow domain are apparent. Acceleration results
from flow convergence-divergence and may be
envisaged to occur adjacent to sharp corners of

fracture where sudden change of aperture occurs.

In these situations, the rotational flow was introduced and mass transferring takes place in the
opposite direction to the main flow. Therefore, the
symmetry of velocity profile decrease and incline
to the smoothest fracture surface. By increasing
inlet velocity (or Reynolds number), the intensity
of rotational flow increases and the reverse flow
becomes more intense. In this case, a new arrangement of normalized velocity distribution can be
found, which indicates that at high values of inlet
velocity the normalized velocity decreases by
increasing the normalized aperture.

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