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Significant heterogeneity in petrophysical properties, including variations in porosity and permeability, are well documented from carbonate systems. These variations in physical properties are typically influenced by original facies heterogeneity, the early diagenetic environment, and later stage diagenetic overprint. The heterogeneities in the Mississippian Madison Formation in the Wind River basin of Wyoming are a complex interplay between these three factors whereby differences from the facies arrangement are first reduced by pervasive dolomitization, but late-stage hydrothermal diagenesis introduces additional heterogeneity. The dolomitized portions of theMadison Formation formhighly productive gas reservoirs at Madden Deep field with typical initial production rates in excess of 50 MMCFGD. In the study area, the Madison Formation is composed of four third-order depositional sequences that contain several small-scale, higher frequency cycles. The cycles and sequences display a facies partitioning with mudstone to wackestone units in the transgressive portion and skeletal and oolitic packstone and grainstone in the regressive portions. The grainstone packages are amalgamated tidally influenced skeletal and oolitic shoals that cover the entire study area. The basal three sequences are completely dolomitized, whereas the fourth sequence is limestone. The distribution of petrophysical properties in the system is influenced only in a limited manner by the smaller scale stratigraphic architecture. Porosity and permeability are controlled by the sequence-scale stratigraphic units, where uniform facies belts and pervasive dolomitization result in flow units that are basically tied to third-order depositional sequences with a thickness of 65– 100 ft (20–30 m). The best reservoir rocks are found in regressive, coarse-grained dolomites of the lower two sequences. Although the amalgamated shoal facies is heterogeneous, dolomitization decompartmentalized these cycles. Fine-grained sediments in the basal transgressive parts of these sequences, along with caliche and chert la
Turkey, in the Near – East, is currently suffering water shortages; with future predictions towards increased aridity. As such, an understanding of past water availability is crucial. This study presents reconstructions of palaeoclimate from stalagmites in north east Turkey over two time periods: 21.6 (± 1.5) ka BP to 7.3 (± 0.3) ka BP; and from ~ 1500 AD to the present day.
Conditions at the LGM (characterised by highest δ18O and δ13C; reduced rate of CaCO3 precipitation) are interpreted as cold and dry with reduced vegetation cover, in line with Israeli and Oman speleothems and Turkish lake core evidence. Towards the Holocene, climate ameliorates and vegetation cover increases. An event centred around 12.4 ka BP is characterised by reduced δ18O, 14C and Sr/Ca and Mg/Ca ratios; and increased δ13C and trace elements (Y, Pb, Cu, Zn and P). This is interpreted as a humid event, contemporaneous with the YD, a time typically associated with arid conditions in the Near- /Middle-East.
A calibration of stable isotopes with climate parameters over the instrumental period is presented; and extrapolated to obtain a record of winter precipitation over the last 500 years. This is the first speleothem reconstruction of its kind in Turkey.
Heterogeneity is a salient feature of every natural geological formation. In the past decades a large body of literature has focused on the effects of heterogeneity on flow and transport problems. These works have substantially improved the understanding of flow and transport phenomena but still fail to characterize many of the important features of an aquifer. Among them, preferential flows and solute paths, connectivity between two points of an aquifer, and interpretation of hydraulic and tracer tests in heterogeneous media are crucial points that need to be properly assessed to obtain accurate model predictions. In this context, the aim of this thesis is twofold:
· to improve the understanding of the effects of heterogeneity on flow and transport phenomena
· to provide new tools for characterizing aquifer heterogeneity
First, we start by theoretically and numerically examine the relationship between two indicators of flow and transport connectivity. The flow connectivity indicator used here is based on the time elapsed for hydraulic response in a pumping test (e.g., the storage coefficient estimated by the Cooper-Jacob method, Sest). Regarding transport, we select the estimated porosity from the observed breakthrough curve (Φ est) in a forced-gradient tracer test. Our results allow explaining the poor correlation between these two indicators, already observed numerically by Knudby and Carrera (2005).
Second, a geostatistical framework has been developed to delineate connectivity patterns using a limited and sparse number of measurements. The methodology allows conditioning the results to three types of data measured over different scales, namely: (a) travel times of convergent tracer tests, ta, (b) estimates of the storage coefficient from pumping tests interpreted using the Cooper-a Jacob method, S est, and (c) measurements of transmissivity point values, T. The ability of the methodology to properly delineate capture zones is assessed through estimations (i.e. ordinary cokriging) and sequential gaussian simulations based on different sets of measurements.
Third, a novel methodology for the interpretation of pumping tests in leaky aquifer systems, referred to as the double inflection point (DIP) method, is presented. The real advantage of the DIP method comes when it is applied with all the existing methods independently to a test in a heterogeneous aquifer. In this case each method yields parameter values that are weighted differently, and thus each method provides different information about the heterogeneity distribution. In particular, the combination of the DIP method and Hantush method is shown to lead to the identification of contrasts between the local transmissivity in the vicinity of the well and the equivalent transmissivity of the perturbed aquifer volume.
Fourth, the meaning of the hydraulic parameters estimated from pumping test performed in leaky aquifers is assessed numerically within a Monte Carlo framework. A synthetic pumping test is interpreted using three existing methods. The resulting estimated parameters are shown to be space dependent and vary with the interpretation method, since each method gives different emphasis to different parts of the timedrawdown data. Finally, we show that by combining the parameter estimates obtained from the different analysis procedures, information about the heterogeneity of the leaky aquifer system may be inferred.
Fifth, an unsaturated highly heterogeneous waste rock pile is modeled using a simple linear transfer function (TF) model. The calibration of the parametric model provides information on the characteristic time of the flow through the matrix and on the fraction of the water that, within each section, is channeled through the macropores. An analysis of the influence of the scale on the results is also provided showing that at large scales the behavior of the system tends to that of an equivalent matrix reservoir masking the effects of preferential flow.
This work presents a methodology for elaborating sinkhole hazard models that incorporate the magnitude and frequency relationships of the subsidence process. The proposed approach has been tested in a sector of the Ebro valley mantled evaporite karst, where sinkholes, largely induced by irrigation practices, have a very high occurrence rate (>50 sinkholes/km2/yr). In this area, covering 10 km2, a total of 943 new cover collapse sinkholes were inventoried in 2005 and 2006. Multiple susceptibility models have been generated analyzing the statistical relationships between the 2005 sinkholes and different sets of variables, including the nearest sinkhole distance. The quantitative evaluation of the prediction capability of these models using the 2006 sinkhole population has allowed the identification of the method and variables that produce the most reliable predictions. The incorporation of the indirect variable nearest sinkhole distance has contributed significantly to increase the quality of the models, despite simplifying the modeling process by using categorical rather than continuous variables. The best susceptibility model, generated with the total sinkhole population and the selected method and variables, has been transformed into a hazard model that provides minimum estimates of the spatial–temporal probability of each pixel to be affected by sinkholes of different diameter ranges. This transformation has been carried out combining two equations derived from the more complete 2006 sinkhole population; one of them expressing the expected spatial–temporal probability of sinkhole occurrence and the other the empirical magnitude and frequency relationships generated for two different types of land surfaces, which control the strength of the surface layer and the size of the sinkholes. The presented method could be applied to predict the spatial–temporal probability of events with different magnitudes related to other geomorphic processes (e.g. landslides).
Preferential flow through solutionally enlarged fractures can be a significant influence on travel times and source area definition in carbonate aquifers. However, it has proven challenging to step beyond a conceptual model to implementing, parameterizing and testing an appropriate numerical model of preferential flow. Here both porous medium and preferential flow models are developed with respect to a deadly contamination of the municipal groundwater supply at Walkerton, Ontario, Canada. The preferential flow model is based on simple orthogonal fracture aperture and spacing. The models are parameterized from bore hole, gamma, flow and video logs resulting in a two order of magnitude lower effective porosity for the preferential flow model. The observed hydraulic conductivity and effective porosity are used to predict groundwater travel times using a porous medium model. These model predictions are compared to a number of independent estimates of effective porosity, including three forced gradient tracer tests. The results show that the effective porosity and hydraulic conductivity values closely match the preferential flow predictions for an equivalent fracture network of _10 m spacing of 1 mm fractures. Three tracer tests resulted in groundwater velocities of hundreds of meters per day, as predicted when an effective porosity of 0.05% was used in the groundwater model. These velocities are consistent with a compilation of 185 tracer test velocities from regional Paleozoic carbonate aquifers. The implication is that carbonate aquifers in southern Ontario are characterized by relatively low-volume dissolutionally enlarged fracture networks that dominate flow and transport. The porous matrix has large storage capacity, but contributes little to transport. Numerical models based on much higher porosities risk significantly underestimating capture zones in such aquifers. The hydraulic conductivity – effective porosity prediction framework provides a general analytical frame work for a preferential flow carbonate aquifer. Not only is the framework readily parameterized from borehole observations, but also it can be implemented in a conventional porous medium model, and critically tested using simple tracer tests.
In this essay, “deep hydrogeology” is somewhat arbitrarily defined as hydrogeology in the subsurface deeper than 1 km, below which the effect of residual permeability at high stresses becomes evident (Neuzil 2003; Rutqvist and Stephansson 2003; Liu et al. 2009). Studies have shown that meteoric fluids are present in the earth’s crust from land surface to at least a depth of 10–15 km (Kozlowsky 1987; Taylor Jr 1990; Zharikov et al. 2003; Ge et al. 2003). At such depths, interaction with surface water and surface events over time periods of 100 or 1,000 years may be minimal, except in areas of very deep mining activities or where deep convection is enhanced by active magmatism. Deep drilling to several kilometers in depth is often done for petroleum and geothermal reservoir exploration and exploitation. The focus of such activities is reservoir identification, capacity evaluation, and fluid and heat extractability. However, it is largely an open area of research to understand the state, structure and evolution of deep hydrogeology over time scales of tens of thousands of years or more, especially in areas lacking petroleum and geothermal resources. Interest in attaining such an understanding has emerged from the need for long-term predictions related to nuclear waste disposal and from recognition of the role that hydrogeology may play in seismicity, orogenesis and various geological processes, as well as in global fluid and chemical cycles. A number of wide-ranging questions may be asked regarding deep hydrogeology, several of which are as follows: What are the current and past states of fluid pressure, temperature and chemical composition in deep formations? How does fluid transport mass and heat? What are the fluid sources and driving mechanisms? What are the magnitude and distribution of porosity and permeability? What are the occurrence and characteristics of large-scale flow, including thermally and chemically driven convection systems? What is the nature of local anomalous fluid pressures and what are their implications? The purpose of this essay is to discuss key issues and research needs in deep hydrogeology. It is based on a workshop on the subject held at Uppsala University in Sweden, with participants from 11 countries, including the USA, Russia, Japan and a number of European countries (Tsang et al. 2012). The following discussion will be divided into sections on permeability structures, driving forces, coupled processes, borehole testing and data analysis, followed by a few concluding remarks.
It already exists several three-dimensional models dealing with groundwater circulation in karst systems. However, few of them are able either to give a large scale prediction of the repartition of the flow conduits or to make a comparison with real field data. Therefore, our objective is to develop a three-dimensional model about the early formation of karst flow conduits and to compare it with actual field data. This geometric and statistical model is based on percolation and random walks. It is computational and can be run on a personal computer. We examine the influence of fissures (joints and bedding planes) of variable permeability and orientations on the development or early flow conduits. The results presented here correspond to computations up to 2015. Because of long runtimes, we focused on some particular stereotypical situations, corresponding to some particular values of the parameters. Regarding the conduit patterns, the opening and directions of fissures have the same qualitative influence in the model than in actual systems. Two other predictions in good accordance with real karst are that flow conduits can either develop close to the water table or deeper, depending on the distribution of permeable fissures; and that, when viewed in the horizontal plane, conduits don't always develop close to the straight line between inlet and outlet. From a quantitative point of view, in the case of weak dips, our model predicts a realistic relationship between the stratal dip, the length of the system and the averaged depth of the conduits. Eventually, we show that the repartition of conduits depends not only on obvious geometrical parameters such as directions and sizes, but also also on other quantities difficult to measure such as the probability of finding open fissures. The lack of such data doesn't enable, at the present time, a whole comparison between model and reality.
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