Transport Phenomena in Heterogeneous Media: Experimental Data Reduction and Analysis

Abstract

Volume averaging theory (VAT) is used to bring a consistent basis to experimental data reduction and analysis by examples in several areas of transport phenomena. Many common correlations, and their weaknesses, are examined using a unified scaling procedure that allows them to be compared to one another. Momentum resistance and internal heat transfer dependencies are analyzed and compared. VAT based analysis is shown to reveal the influence of morphological characteristics of the media, to suggest scaling parameters that allow a wide variety of different porous media morphologies to be normalized, often eliminating the need for further experimental efforts, and to clarify the relationships between differing experimental configurations. The origin, and insufficiency, of electrical conductivity and momentum transport “cross-correlation” approaches in efforts to find analogies by mathematical comparison without examining the physical foundations of phenomena are described and explained.