On the parallel solution of hydro-mechanical problems with fracture networks and contact conditions

The paper presents a numerical method for the simulation of flow and mechanics in fractured rock. The governing equations which couple the effects in the rock mass and in the fractures are obtained using the discrete fracture-matrix approach. The fracture flow is driven by the cubic law, and the non-penetration contact conditions prevent fractures from closing. A stable finite element discretization is proposed for the displacement-pressure-flux formulation. The resulting nonlinear algebraic system of equations and inequalities is decoupled using a robust iterative splitting into the linearized flow subproblem, and the quadratic programming problem for the mechanical part. The non-penetration conditions are solved by means of the MPGP algorithm. The capability of the numerical scheme is demonstrated on a benchmark problem for borehole excavation with hundreds of fractures in 3D. The paper's novelty consists in combination of three crucial ingredients: (i) application of discrete fracture matrix approach, (ii) robust iterative splitting of resulting nonlinear algebraic system working for real-world 3D problems and (iii) efficient solution of its mechanical quadratic programming part with large number of fractures in mutual contact by means of own solvers with known rate of convergence implemented into in-house PERMON library.