Effect of water saturation on gas slippage in circular and angular pores

A unified model for gas slip flow through circular and angular pores in both single phase flow and two‐phase flow conditions is developed, and the effect of water saturation on gas slippage factors in different pore shapes are revealed. For circular pores, the water saturation retains as thin film binding on pore surfaces without changing the shape of the cross section, and the hydraulic diameters continuously reduce as water saturation increases, directly leading to an increase in the slippage factor. However, for angular pores, the water saturation retains as both films at boundaries and condensations at corners, and the film‐water and corner‐water gradually change their cross‐section shape (from sharp corners to round corners), which further affects the gas slip behavior. Due to the presence of round corners, the ratio of the cross‐sectional area and perimeter, which can also be regarded as the reciprocal of a specific surface area, can even increase at a low water saturation condition. Thus the collisions between gas molecules and pore boundaries weaken, resulting in a slight reduction in the gas slippage factor. This interesting finding in the angular pore case directly explains the contradiction of the published experimental results with the general knowledge (i.e., the gas slip factor always increases as water saturation increases). Thus, the validity of the common assumption regarding actual porous media as capillaries with a circular cross‐section must be considered more carefully. © 2018 American Institute of Chemical Engineers AIChE J , 64: 3529–3541, 2018