Flow and Reactive Transport in Heterogeneous Geological Systems

Sustainable water resources for a future society strongly depends on todays human actions and our understanding of the earths' water cycle. The latter becomes increasingly important, as todays water resources are increasingly in conflict with other human needs, such as energy, food, waste disposal and mining of basic geogenic raw materials.

It is the task of hydrogeology to provide solutions for a sustainable water resources management and raise the next generation of hydrogeologists. This endeavor can be met by advancing the fundamental understanding of uxes within and across hydrological compartments from small to large scales. Advanced quantitative characterization of uxes needs an advanced understanding of flow and transport processes. The latter depend strongly upon the inherent physical, chemical and biological heterogeneity of the earth. The following three challenges are essential for future water resources research: a) development of new techniques for measuring heterogeneity of the earth and processes therein, b) advancing the quantitative characterization of earth heterogeneity and processes therein c) promote the integration of earth heterogeneity in predictive models for flow and transport (Figure 1).

Figure 1: Schematic diagram of ow and transport processes in earth systems and their determining factors (blue); conceptual procedure for understanding flow and transport processes in earth systems (red).

The seminar sheds light on qualitative and quantitative understanding of ow and transport in heterogeneous geologic media across scales. Together with recent laboratory and eld experiments, development of hydrogeological and numerical models are discussed.

At the laboratory scale, new experiments on heat transport in fractures as function of variable aperture, an apparatus for experimental upscaling and a multiple tracer test approach for understanding clogging effects in porous media are presented. At the eld scale, advanced hydrogeophysical experiments for characterizing subsurface structures, local ow velocities and transport processes are introduced. At the regional scale, the estimation of water resources in the south-west of Madagascar is shown in the context of an interdisciplinary project on sustainable land management.