ABSTRACT

Heat transfer by natural convection from various types of surfaces embedded in a porous medium is of fundamental importance in many practical applications, such as, insulation of buildings and equipment, energy storage and recovery systems, the storage of heatgenerating materials such as grains and coal, geothermal reservoirs, nuclear waste disposal, and chemical reactor engineering (Sheffield and Metzner, 1976; Hickox et al., 1980; Wakao and Kaguei, 1982; Riley, 1988; Whitaker, 1989; Lemcoff et al., 1990; Farr et al., 1991; Lai, 2000; Vafai and Hadim, 2000; Sahimi, 2011; Sha, 2011; Narasimhan, 2013; Nield and Bejan, 2013; Singh et al., 2014; Umavathi and Shekar, 2015). Geophysical applications range from the flow of groundwater around hot intrusions to the stability of snow against avalanches. The abovementioned applications involve Newtonian fluids that saturate porous media. However, in ceramic engineering, enhanced oil recovery, and filtration, there are instances where non-Newtonian fluid heat transfer studies in porous media assume importance. The significant research work on non-Newtonian fluid heat transfer in porous media has been well reviewed by Shenoy (1994) and can be referred to for details.