Impact of capillary forces on large-scale migration of CO2

Abstract

In this paper we derive closed-form constitutive functions for a vertically integrated model including gravitational and capillary forces. Such models are appropriate for CO2 storage, and we use our derived functions to show the impact of capillary forces on tip migration speed. A particularly striking aspect is how capillary forces, while entering dispersive terms in the the ne-scale three-dimensional equations, appear in non-linear self-sharpening terms in the integrated equations. We highlight the physical interpretation of this change in character of the equations in the discussion.