Preconditioning method applied to near-critical carbon-dioxide flows in micro-channel

A numerical method for simulating near-critical carbon-dioxide flows in a micro-channel is presented. This method is based on the preconditioning method applied to the compressible Navier-Stokes equations. The Peng-Robinson equation of state is introduced to evaluate the properties of near-critical fluids. As numerical examples, Near-critical carbon-dioxide flows in a square cavity and in a micro-channel are calculated and the calculated results are compared with the experimental data and the theoretical results. Finally, we demonstrate that the compressibility dominates the near-critical carbon-dioxide flows in a micro-channel even if the flow is very slow and the Reynolds number is very low.