Generation of complex karstic conduit networks with a hydrochemical model
Files
Download Full Text
Publication Date
8-1-2017
Publication Title
Water Resources Research
Volume Number
53
Issue Number
8
Abstract
In this paper, we present a hydrochemical model that can be used to generate plausible karstic conduit networks that honor what is known about geology, hydrology, and topography of a karst system. To make the model applicable to a range of natural karst systems, we introduce a flexible and physically realistic flow boundary condition along the land surface. Moreover, whereas comparable existing speleogenesis models use an explicit reactive‐transport scheme, we propose an implicit reactive‐transport scheme to permit a coarser spatial discretization of the conduit cells. An application to a real karst system illustrates that the model can generate a realistic karstic network that reproduces observed hydrologic behavior in terms of current spring flow rates, regional hydraulic head field as well as average groundwater residence times. Our model provides a useful tool to generate ensembles of possible karstic conduit networks that may be used within a stochastic framework to analyze flow and transport prediction uncertainty associated with a lack of knowledge about network geometry.
Document Type
Article
Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
https://doi.org/10.1002/2017WR020768
Language
English
Recommended Citation
de Rooij, Rob and Graham, Wendy, "Generation of complex karstic conduit networks with a hydrochemical model" (2017). KIP Articles. 10027.
https://digitalcommons.usf.edu/kip_articles/10027
