Tritium–helium groundwater age used to constrain a groundwater flow model of a valley-fill aquifer contaminated with trichloroethylene (Quebec, Canada)

Murphy, Samantha; Ouellon, Thomas; Ballard, Jean-Marc; Lefebvre, René; Clark, Ian D.

doi:10.1007/s10040-010-0662-5

Cited by 48 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 26 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…These estimates can be compared with those calculated by the groundwater flow model and companion transport model to provide independent calibration targets (e.g. McMahon et al ., ; Murphy et al ., ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

Conceptual and numerical models for groundwater flow in an arid inland river basin

Yao

Chen

Liu

et al. 2014

Hydrological Processes

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Abstract:The Heihe River Basin (HRB) is an inland watershed in northwest China with a total area of approximately 130,000 km 2 , stretching from the Qilian Mountains in the south to the oases and agricultural fields in the middle and further to the Gobi desert in the north bordering Mongolia. As part of a major ecohydrological research initiative to provide a stronger scientific underpinning for sustainable water management in arid ecosystems, a regional-scale integrated ecological and hydrological model is being developed, incorporating the knowledge based on the results of environmental isotope tracer analysis and the multiscale observation datasets. The first step in the model development effort is to construct and calibrate a groundwater flow model for the middle and lower HRB where the oases and vegetation along the Heihe river corridor are highly dependent on groundwater. In this study, the software tool 'Arc Hydro Groundwater' is used to build and visualize a hydrogeological data model for the HRB that links all relevant spatiotemporal hydrogeological data in a unified geodatabase within the ArcGIS environment. From the conceptual model, a regional-scale groundwater flow model has been developed using MODFLOW-2005. Critical considerations in developing the flow model include the representation of mountainous terrains and fluvial valleys by individual model layers, treatment of aquifer heterogeneities across multiple scales and selection of proper observation data and boundary conditions for model calibration. This paper discusses these issues in the context of the Heihe River Basin, but the results and insights from this study will have important implications for other large, regional groundwater modelling studies, especially in arid and semiarid inland river basins.

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

Conceptual and numerical models for groundwater flow in an arid inland river basin

Yao

Chen

Liu

et al. 2014

Hydrological Processes

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Besides addressing the research questions presented above, the purpose of this paper is to present the data set to the scientific community to solicit further research. Future research opportunities include calibration of numerical groundwater models (Castro et al, 1998;Ivey et al, 2008;Murphy et al, 2010;Sanford, 2010;Sheets et al, 1998), paleoclimate reconstruction (Stute et al, 1992;Aeschbach-Hertig et al, 2000b;Hall et al, 2005;Castro et al, 2007;Klump et al, 2008;Stute et al, 1995b;Corcho Alvarado et al, 2009), water quality vulnerability in relation to groundwater age (Wright et al, 2004;Johnston et al, 1998;Tesoriero et al, 2007;Visser et al, 2007), and identification of regions where mantle fluids are transported into shallow aquifers (Boles et al, 2015;Kulongoski et al, 2013;Castro, 2004;Kulongoski et al, 2003;Jenden et al, 1988;Poreda et al, 1986). The geostatistical analysis presented here is a first step in disseminating and visualizing the data set.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 98%

Geostatistical analysis of tritium, groundwater age and other noble gas derived parameters in California

et al. 2016

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Key characteristics of California groundwater systems related to aquifer vulnerability, sustainability, recharge locations and mechanisms, and anthropogenic impact on recharge are revealed in a spatial geostatistical analysis of a unique data set of tritium, noble gases and other isotopic analyses unprecedented in size at nearly 4000 samples. The correlation length of key groundwater residence time parameters varies between tens of kilometers ((3)H; age) to the order of a hundred kilometers ((4)Heter; (14)C; (3)Hetrit). The correlation length of parameters related to climate, topography and atmospheric processes is on the order of several hundred kilometers (recharge temperature; δ(18)O). Young groundwater ages that highlight regional recharge areas are located in the eastern San Joaquin Valley, in the southern Santa Clara Valley Basin, in the upper LA basin and along unlined canals carrying Colorado River water, showing that much of the recent recharge in central and southern California is dominated by river recharge and managed aquifer recharge. Modern groundwater is found in wells with the top open intervals below 60 m depth in the southeastern San Joaquin Valley, Santa Clara Valley and Los Angeles basin, as the result of intensive pumping and/or managed aquifer recharge operations.

show abstract

“…Groundwater mean age can be modeled using the advection-dispersion equation (Goode 1996), and tracer-derived ages can be used to help constrain groundwater models (Portniaguine and Solomon 1998;Plummer et al 2004;Sanford et al 2004;Murphy et al 2011;Sanford 2011). Groundwater mean age can be modeled using the advection-dispersion equation (Goode 1996), and tracer-derived ages can be used to help constrain groundwater models (Portniaguine and Solomon 1998;Plummer et al 2004;Sanford et al 2004;Murphy et al 2011;Sanford 2011).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

High Performance Simulation of Environmental Tracers in Heterogeneous Domains

2013

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

In this study, we use PFLOTRAN, a highly scalable, parallel, flow, and reactive transport code to simulate the concentrations of 3H, 3He, CFC-11, CFC-12, CFC-113, SF6, 39Ar, and the mean groundwater age in heterogeneous fields on grids with an excess of 10 million nodes. We utilize this computational platform to simulate the concentration of multiple tracers in high-resolution, heterogeneous 2D and 3D domains, and calculate tracer-derived ages. Tracer-derived ages show systematic biases toward younger ages when the groundwater age distribution contains water older than the maximum tracer age. The deviation of the tracer-derived age distribution from the true groundwater age distribution increases with increasing heterogeneity of the system. However, the effect of heterogeneity is diminished as the mean travel time gets closer to the tracer age limit. Age distributions in 3D domains differ significantly from 2D domains. 3D simulations show decreased mean age, and less variance in age distribution for identical heterogeneity statistics. High-performance computing allows for investigation of tracer and groundwater age systematics in high-resolution domains, providing a platform for understanding and utilizing environmental tracer and groundwater age information in heterogeneous 3D systems.

show abstract

Tritium–helium groundwater age used to constrain a groundwater flow model of a valley-fill aquifer contaminated with trichloroethylene (Quebec, Canada)

Cited by 48 publications

References 26 publications

Conceptual and numerical models for groundwater flow in an arid inland river basin

Conceptual and numerical models for groundwater flow in an arid inland river basin

Geostatistical analysis of tritium, groundwater age and other noble gas derived parameters in California

High Performance Simulation of Environmental Tracers in Heterogeneous Domains

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About