Instability of the Phase Transition Front during Water Injection into High-Temperature Rock

Abstract

Water injection into a high-temperature geothermal reservoir saturated with superheated vapor is investigated. A solution to the one-dimensional problem in the form of a traveling wave is found. It is shown that there exist two types of solutions which correspond to the boiling of water and the condensation of vapor. In the condensation regime with high initial pressure, vapor ahead of the phase transition front is shown to be in a supercooled state. For moderate or law initial pressure, solutions with condensation and boiling are thermodynamically consistent. Linear stability of the phase transition surface between the water and vapor regions is analyzed. It is shown that the phase transition front moving at constant velocity is always unstable.