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AGU: Geophysical Research Letters

 

Keywords

  • rate-limited mass transfer
  • bicontinuum
  • electrical resistivity

Index Terms

  • Exploration Geophysics: Magnetic and electrical methods
  • Hydrology: Groundwater transport
  • Hydrology: Hydrogeophysics
  • Hydrology: Water supply
  • Hydrology: Instruments and techniques: modeling

Abstract

Geoelectrical evidence of bicontinuum transport in groundwater

Kamini Singha

Department of Geosciences, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA

F. D. Day-Lewis

Office of Ground Water, Branch of Geophysics, U.S. Geological Survey, Storrs, Connecticut, USA

J. W. Lane Jr.

Office of Ground Water, Branch of Geophysics, U.S. Geological Survey, Storrs, Connecticut, USA

Bicontinuum models and rate-limited mass transfer (RLMT) explain complex transport behavior (e.g., long tailing and rebound) in heterogeneous geologic media, but experimental verification is problematic because geochemical samples represent the mobile component of the pore space. Here, we present geophysical evidence of RLMT at the field scale during an aquifer-storage and recovery experiment in a fractured limestone aquifer in Charleston, South Carolina. We observe a hysteretic relation between measurements of pore-fluid conductivity and bulk electrical conductivity; this hysteresis contradicts advective-dispersive transport and the standard petrophysical model relating pore-fluid and bulk conductivity, but can be explained by considering bicontinuum transport models that include first-order RLMT. Using a simple numerical model, we demonstrate that geoelectrical measurements are sensitive to bicontinuum transport and RLMT parameters, which are otherwise difficult to infer from direct, hydrologic measurements.

Received 17 March 2007; accepted 11 May 2007; published 23 June 2007.

Citation: Singha, K., F. D. Day-Lewis, and J. W. Lane Jr. (2007), Geoelectrical evidence of bicontinuum transport in groundwater, Geophys. Res. Lett., 34, L12401, doi:10.1029/2007GL030019.

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