Effective viscosity and permeability of porous media

The effective properties of porous media composed of equally sized spherical particles are investigated. Flow inside porous media is modelled using Brinkman's equations, which include two semi-empirical coefficients: an effective viscosity and a resistance coefficient (1/permeability). The differential method is used to deduce the dependencies of these coefficients on both porosity and the particle size. The deduced dependency of permeability on porosity is found to agree reasonably well with known dependencies obtained by computer simulations of flow in random porous media. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.