Nanofluidics for Energy

许多大规模的能源应用依赖于小规模的流体输送。在过去的几年里，我们的团队和其他人已经开发了微流体方法，用于生物能源，碳封存，储层流体分析，以及量化常规微孔油气储层的孔隙尺度输送。然而，目前全球能源正在被非常规油气作业所重塑，即纳米多孔页岩气和致密油储层的水力压裂。裂缝性储层流体在高温高压条件下的运移是多组分多相流在纳米孔隙和微裂缝中的复杂相互作用，可能为润湿型或非润湿型。这是一个非常复杂的过程，人们对它知之甚少。

Many large scale energy applications rely on small scale fluid transport. Over the last few years our group and others have developed microfluidic approaches for bioenergy, carbon sequestration, reservoir fluid analysis, and quantifying pore-scale transport in conventional microporous oil and gas reservoirs. Current global energy, however, is being reshaped by unconventional oil and gas operations, namely the hydraulic fracturing of nanoporous shale gas and tight oil reservoirs. Transport of fluids in fractured reservoirs is a complex interplay of multicomponent multiphase flow through both nano-pores and micro-fractures, which may be wetting or non-wetting, at high temperature and pressure. This is a very complicated process that is poorly understood.