Computer simulation of multi-phase and multi-component fluid flows including physics of under-resolved porous structures

A computer system comprises:

• one or more processor devices;
• memory coupled to the one or more processor devices;
• storage storing executable computer instructions for conducting a fluid simulation of a porous medium, the instructions to configure the one or more processors to:
• access, from memory, a three dimensional digital image of a three-dimensional porous medium;
• perform image processing on the accessed three dimensional digital image;
• based on performing the image processing, generate a representation of the three dimensional porous medium, the representation including pore space corresponding to the porous medium;
• determine that the representation includes at least one portion of under-resolved pore structure in the porous medium, the under-resolved pore structure having a pore size smaller than a resolution of the fluid simulation;
• and
• digitally construct a visual representation of fluid force curves that correspond to fluid forces in the under-resolved pore structure in the representation.

A computer program product tangibly stored on a computer readable non-transitory storage device that stores executable computer instructions to conduct a fluid simulation of a porous medium, the instructions for causing a computing system to:

• access, from memory, a three dimensional digital image of a three-dimensional porous medium;
• perform image processing on the accessed three dimensional digital image;
• based on performing the image processing, generate a representation of the three dimensional porous medium, the representation including pore space corresponding to the porous medium;
• determine that the representation includes at least one portion of under-resolved pore structure in the porous medium, the under-resolved pore structure having a pore size smaller than a resolution of the fluid simulation;
• and
• digitally construct a visual representation of fluid force curves that correspond to fluid forces in the under-resolved pore structure in the representation.