Curved free convection plume paths in porous media

This short paper presents some numerical simulations of how free convection plumes in a porous medium are affected by the presence of a neighboring boundary or a neighboring plume. It is found that they are drawn towards a vertical boundary with the 'centreline' following a curved path from the source to the boundary. Thus the boundary entrains the plume in a manner which is reminiscent of the well-known Coanda effect in aerodynamics where a fluid jet is drawn towards a solid surface. When two plumes are present in a horizontally unbounded porous medium, the plumes are drawn towards one another before rising vertically. In many cases where one plume is weaker or lower than the other, the former is affected greatly by the latter, but not vice versa.