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Results for “robust block preconditioners”

Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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12 records
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2020

Robust block preconditioners for poroelasticity

In this paper we develop and analyze several preconditioners for the linear systems arising from discretized poroelasticity problems. The preconditioners include one block preconditioner for the two-field Biot model and several preconditioners for the classical three-field Biot model. We manage to analyze these different preconditioners under a same theoretical framework and show that all of them are uniformly optimal with respect to material and discretization parameters. Numerical tests demonstrate the robustness of these preconditioners.

42 ENGINEERING↗
DOE OSTI2020

Efficient solvers for hybridized three-field mixed finite element coupled poromechanics

We consider a mixed hybrid finite element formulation for coupled poromechanics. A stabilization strategy based on a macro-element approach is advanced to eliminate the spurious pressure modes appearing in undrained/incompressible conditions. The efficient solution of the stabilized mixed hybrid block system is addressed by developing a class of block triangular preconditioners based on a Schur-complement approximation strategy. Robustness, computational efficiency and scalability of the proposed approach are theoretically discussed and tested using challenging benchmark problems on massively parallel architectures.

42 ENGINEERING↗
DOE OSTI2021

Enhanced relaxed physical factorization preconditioner for coupled poromechanics

The relaxed physical factorization (RPF) preconditioner is a recent algorithm allowing for the efficient and robust solution to the block linear systems arising from the three-field displacement-velocity-pressure formulation of coupled poromechanics. For its application, however, it is necessary to invert blocks with the algebraic form C^ = (C + βFF T ), where C is a symmetric positive definite matrix, FF T a rank-deficient term, and β a real non-negative coefficient. The inversion of C^, performed in an inexact way, can become unstable for large values of β, as it usually occurs at some stages of a full poromechanical simulation. In this work, we propose a family of algebraic techniques to stabilize the inexact solve with C^. This strategy can prove useful in other problems as well where such an issue might arise, such as augmented Lagrangian preconditioning techniques for Navier-Stokes or incompressible elasticity. First, we introduce an iterative scheme obtained by a natural splitting of matrix C^. Second, we develop a technique based on the use of a proper projection operator annihilating the near-kernel modes of C^. Both approaches give rise to a novel class of preconditioners denoted as Enhanced RPF (ERPF). Furthermore, effectiveness and robustness of the proposed algorithms are demonstrated in both theoretical benchmarks and real-world large-size applications, outperforming the native RPF preconditioner.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
DOE OSTI2024

Scalable Multiphysics Block Preconditioning for Low Mach Number Compressible Resistive MHD with Application to Magnetic Confinement Fusion

This study investigates multiphysics block preconditioners that are critical in devising scalable Newton–Krylov iterative solvers for longer time-scale fully implicit fluid plasma models. The specific model of interest is the visco-resistive, low Mach number, compressible magnetohydrodynamics (MHD) model. This model describes the dynamics of conducting fluids in the presence of electromagnetic fields and can be used to study aspects of astrophysical phenomena, important science and technology applications, and basic plasma physics. The specific application of interest that motivates this study is the macroscopic simulation of longer time-scale stability and disruptions of magnetic confinement fusion devices, specifically the ITER Tokamak. The computational solution of the governing balance equations for mass, momentum, heat transfer, and magnetic induction for resistive MHD systems can be extremely challenging. These difficulties arise from both the strong nonlinear, nonsymmetric coupling of fluid and electromagnetic phenomena as well as the significant range of time and length scales that the interactions of these physical mechanisms produce. To handle the range of time and spatial scales of interest, a fully implicit unstructured variational multiscale finite element formulation is employed. For the scalable solution of the Newton linearized systems, fully coupled block preconditioners are designed to leverage algebraic multigrid subsolves. In conclusion, results are presented for the strong and weak scaling of the method as well as the robustness of these techniques for a large range of Lundquist numbers.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
DOE OSTI2022

Fast Solution of Fully Implicit Runge--Kutta and Discontinuous Galerkin in Time for Numerical PDEs, Part II: Nonlinearities and DAEs

Fully implicit Runge--Kutta (IRK) methods have many desirable accuracy and stability properties as time integration schemes, but high-order IRK methods are not commonly used in practice with large-scale numerical PDEs because of the difficulty of solving the stage equations. This paper introduces a theoretical and algorithmic framework for solving the nonlinear equations that arise from IRK methods (and discontinuous Galerkin discretizations in time) applied to nonlinear numerical PDEs, including PDEs with algebraic constraints. Several new linearizations of the nonlinear IRK equations are developed, offering faster and more robust convergence than the often-considered simplified Newton, as well as an effective preconditioner for the true Jacobian if exact Newton iterations are desired. Inverting these linearizations requires solving a set of block 2 x 2 systems. Under quite general assumptions, it is proven that the preconditioned 2 x 2 operator's condition number is bounded by a small constant close to one, independent of the spatial discretization, spatial mesh, and time step, and with only weak dependence on the number of stages or integration accuracy. Moreover, the new method is built using the same preconditioners needed for backward Euler-type time stepping schemes, so can be readily added to existing codes. The new methods are applied to several challenging fluid flow problems, including the compressible Euler and Navier--Stokes equations, and the vorticity-streamfunction formulation of the incompressible Euler and Navier--Stokes equations. Up to 10th-order accuracy is demonstrated using Gauss IRK, while in all cases fourth-order Gauss IRK requires roughly half the number of preconditioner applications as required by standard Singly diagonally implicit Runge--Kutta methods.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
DOE OSTI2020

High-order matrix-free incompressible flow solvers with GPU acceleration and low-order refined preconditioners

In this work, we present a matrix-free flow solver for high-order finite element discretizations of the incompressible Navier-Stokes and Stokes equations with GPU acceleration. For high polynomial degrees, assembling the matrix for the linear systems resulting from the finite element discretization can be prohibitively expensive, both in terms of computational complexity and memory. For this reason, it is necessary to develop matrix-free operators and preconditioners, which can be used to efficiently solve these linear systems without access to the matrix entries themselves. The matrix-free operator evaluations utilize GPU-accelerated sum-factorization techniques to minimize memory movement and maximize throughput. The preconditioners developed in this work are based on a low-order refined methodology with parallel subspace corrections, as described for diffusion problems in [1]. The saddle-point Stokes system is solved using block-preconditioning techniques, which are robust in mesh size, polynomial degree, time step, and viscosity. For the incompressible Navier-Stokes equations, we make use of projection (fractional step) methods, which require Helmholtz and Poisson solves at each time step. The performance of our flow solvers is assessed on several benchmark problems in two and three spatial dimensions.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
DOE OSTI2026

Multi-physics Preconditioning for Thermally Activated Batteries

Thermal batteries, also known as molten-salt batteries, are single-use reserve power systems activated by pyrotechnic heat generation, which transitions the solid electrolyte into a molten state. The simulation of these batteries relies on multiphysics modeling to evaluate performance and behavior under various conditions. This paper presents advancements in scalable preconditioning strategies for the Thermally Activated Battery Simulator (TABS) tool, enabling efficient solutions to the coupled electrochemical systems that dominate computational costs in thermal battery simulations. We propose a hierarchical block Gauss-Seidel preconditioner implemented through the Teko package in Trilinos, which effectively addresses the challenges posed by tightly coupled physics, including charge transport, porous flow, and species diffusion. The preconditioner leverages scalable subblock solvers, including smoothed aggregation algebraic multigrid (SA-AMG) methods and domain-decomposition techniques, to achieve robust convergence and parallel scalability. Strong and weak scaling studies demonstrate the solver’s ability to handle problem sizes up to 51.3 million degrees of freedom on 2048 processors, achieving near sub-second setup and solve times for the end-to-end electrochemical solve. These advancements significantly improve the computational efficiency and turnaround time of thermal battery simulations, paving the way for higher-resolution models and enabling the transition from 2D axisymmetric to full 3D simulations.

25 ENERGY STORAGE↗
DOE OSTI2025

A Scalable Interior‐Point Gauss–Newton Method for PDE‐Constrained Optimization With Bound Constraints

Here, we present a scalable approach to solve a class of partial differential equation (PDE)‐constrained optimization problems with bound constraints. This approach utilizes a robust full‐space interior‐point (IP)‐Gauss–Newton optimization method. To cope with the poorly‐conditioned IP‐Gauss–Newton saddle‐point linear systems that need to be solved approximately, once per optimization step, we propose two spectrally related preconditioners. These preconditioners leverage the limited informativeness of data in regularized PDE‐constrained optimization problems. A block Gauss–Seidel preconditioner is proposed for the GMRES‐based solution of the IP‐Gauss–Newton linear systems. It is shown, for a large‐class of PDE‐ and bound‐constrained optimization problems, that the spectrum of the block Gauss–Seidel preconditioned IP‐Gauss–Newton matrix is asymptotically independent of discretization and is not impacted by the ill‐conditioning that notoriously plagues interior‐point methods. We exploit symmetry of the IP‐Gauss–Newton linear systems and propose a regularization and log‐barrier Hessian preconditioner for the preconditioned conjugate gradient (PCG)‐based solution of the equivalent IP‐Gauss–Newton–Schur complement linear systems. The eigenvalues of the block Gauss–Seidel preconditioned IP‐Gauss–Newton matrix, that are not equal to one, are identical to the eigenvalues of the regularization and log‐barrier Hessian preconditioned Schur complement matrix. The scalability of the approach is demonstrated on two example problems. The numerical solution of these optimization problems is shown to require a discretization independent number of IP‐Gauss–Newton linear solves. Furthermore, the linear systems are solved in a discretization and IP ill‐conditioning independent number of preconditioned Krylov subspace iterations. The parallel scalability of the preconditioner, achieved via algebraic multigrid component solvers when applicable, and the aforementioned algorithmic scalability permits a parallel scalable means to compute solutions of a large class of PDE‐ and bound‐constrained problems.

PDE-constrained optimization↗
DOE OSTI2021

Linear and Nonlinear Solvers for Simulating Multiphase Flow within Large-Scale Engineered Subsurface Systems

Simulation of multiphase flow in the subsurface is well-known to be computationally challenging. While there have been many studies that have explored approaches to overcoming these challenges, they often utilize relatively simple case studies. In this paper, we focus on the unique numerical challenges posed by modeling large-scale engineered subsurface systems, characterized by discrete features embedded in a heterogeneous natural subsurface setting. The man-made features such as shafts, tunnels, and barriers often cause multiple challenges in modeling the domain for multiphase porous media flow. This flow scenario can have a wide range of applications such as nuclear waste repositories, enhanced recovery of a petroleum reservoir, geothermal engineering, and carbon sequestration. An example of these severe numerical challenges is the case of performance assessment (PA) for Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP), the only operating deep geological repository in the US, which simulates extreme material properties of bedded salt rock formation and extreme contrast due to open excavation next to the formation. The models have extremes not only of permeability and porosity but also of the constitutive models needed for multiphase flow; additionally, they have process models like salt creep closure reducing porosity over time, fracturing in clay and anhydrite interbeds of the bedded salt, gas generation from the waste materials, and unintentional human borehole intrusions in some scenarios. Numerical simulations require the solution of coupled systems of nonlinear PDEs; in our work, we use the open-source simulator PFLOTRAN which is based on Finite Volume discretization. The solution of the nonlinear equations requires use of the Newton-Raphson iteration at each time step, which entails the solution of the linearized Jacobian system at each iteration. The effects of all the processes (i.e., large number of unknowns, highly nonlinear constitutive relations, large contrasts in material properties in short distances) lead to an ill-conditioned Jacobian matrix that severely challenges traditional linear solver, i.e., stabilized biconjugate gradient with block Jacobi incomplete LU preconditioner (BCGS-ILU) leading to non-convergence for traditional Newton-Raphson nonlinear solver causing unacceptably long computation time for each model. This paper presents linear solvers such as constrained pressure residual (CPR) two-stage preconditioner with alternate-block-factorization (ABF) and quasi- implicit pressure and explicit saturation (QIMPES) decouplers and flexible generalized residual solver (FGMRES). The new general-purpose nonlinear solver, Newton trust-region dogleg Cauchy (NTRDC), is also introduced to resolve extreme nonlinearities in the models. We demonstrate the effectiveness of each method relative to the default BCGS-Newton solver. The two best cases had nearly 50 times speed-up and achieved completion of a simulation in 14 hours that never completed due to non-convergence with the default solver. We also investigate the strong scalability of each method and discuss some of the deficiencies found for Block Jacobi preconditioner using parallel domain decomposition, and node packing effects of modern processor architecture.

Preconditioner, Nonlinear, Porous media, Multiphas↗
DOE OSTI2022

Scalable preconditioning for the stabilized contact mechanics problem

We present a family of preconditioning strategies for the contact problem in fractured and faulted porous media. We combine low-order continuous finite elements to simulate the bulk deformation with piecewise constant Lagrange multipliers to impose the frictional contact constraints. This formulation is not uniformly inf-sup stable and requires stabilization. We improve previous work by Franceschini et al. (2020) by introducing a novel jump stabilization technique that requires only local geometrical and mechanical properties. We then design scalable preconditioning strategies that take advantage of the block structure of the Jacobian matrix using a physics-based partitioning of the unknowns by field type, namely displacement and Lagrange multipliers. The key to the success of the proposed preconditioners is a pseudo-Schur complement obtained by eliminating the Lagrange multiplier degrees of freedom, which can then be efficiently solved using an optimal multigrid method. Numerical results, including complex real-world problems, are presented to illustrate theoretical properties, scalability and robustness of the preconditioner. A comparison with other approaches available in the literature is also provided.

58 GEOSCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2026

Fast solvers for tokamak fluid models with PETSc

Multigrid (MG) is widely recognized as a highly effective solver for the model problem, the Laplacian, but textbook MG fails on most problems of interest. MG methods have been applied to complex, real-world applications with careful consideration of the physical model and discretization. In this work we develop the first step in applying MG methods to science and engineering relevant magnetohydrodynamics (MHD) tokamak models in the M3D-C1 (https://m3dc1.pppl.gov) fusion energy science code. The semi-implicit time integrator in M3D-C1 is composed of many linear solves. The implicit advance of the momentum equation is the most challenging and is the focus of this work. The current production solver in M3D-C1 is a block Jacobi (BJ) preconditioner within a Krylov solver, where blocks group degrees of freedom on planes of constant toroidal coordinate. BJ convergence degrades as the number of planes increases due to the spectral properties of the matrix preconditioned with BJ. The partially magnetic field-aligned, regular toroidal grid structure in M3D-C1 is amenable to semi-coarsening geometric MG in the toroidal direction. This paper develops such a solver and demonstrates competitive performance on a runaway electron model of a SPARC (https://cfs.energy/technology/sparc) disruption, and superior robustness on a stellarator model on which the BJ solver fails to converge.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2022

A scalable DG solver for the electroneutral Nernst-Planck equations

The robust, scalable simulation of flowing electrochemical systems is increasingly important due to the synergy between intermittent renewable energy and electrochemical technologies such as energy storage and chemical manufacturing. The high Péclet regime of many such applications prevents the use of off-the-shelf discretization methods. In this work, we present a high-order Discontinuous Galerkin scheme for the electroneutral Nernst-Planck equations. The chosen charge conservation formulation allows for the specific treatment of the different physics: upwinding for advection and migration, and interior penalty for diffusion of ionic species as well the electric potential. Similarly, the formulation enables different treatments in the preconditioner: AMG for the potential blocks and ILU-based methods for the advection-dominated concentration blocks. Here we evaluate the convergence rate of the discretization scheme through numerical tests. Strong scaling results for two preconditioning approaches are shown for a large 3D flow-plate reactor example.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗