TITLE:
Enhancing Groundwater Quality through Computational Modeling and Simulation to Optimize Transport and Interaction Parameters in Porous Media
AUTHORS:
Akhil Waghmare, Padmanabhan Seshaiyer
KEYWORDS:
Water Quality, Computational Modeling, Colloid Transport
JOURNAL NAME:
Journal of Water Resource and Protection,
Vol.7 No.5,
March
25,
2015
ABSTRACT: There is
a shortage of high quality drinking water caused by the introduction of
contaminants into aquifers from various sources including industrial processes
and uncontrolled sewage. Studies have shown that colloids, collections of
nanoparticles, have the potential to remediate polluted groundwater. For such
applications of nanoparticles, it is important to understand the movement of
colloids. This study aims to enhance the previously developed MNM1D (Micro- and
Nanoparticle transport Model in porous media in one-dimensional geometry) by
making more realistic assumptions about physical properties of the
groundwater-porous medium system by accounting for a non-constant flow velocity
and the presence of electromagnetic interactions. This was accomplished by
coupling the original model with the Darcy-Forchheimer fluid model, which is
specific to transport in porous media, coupled with electromagnetic effects.
The resulting model also accounts for attachment and detachment phenomena, both
of the linear and Langmuirian type, as well as changes to hydrochemical
parameters such as maximum colloidal particle concentration in the porous
medium. The system of partial-differential equations that make up the model was
solved using an implicit finite-difference discretization along with the
iterative Newton’s method. A parameter estimation study was also conducted to
quantify parameters of interest. This more realistic model of colloid transport
in porous media will contribute to the production of a more efficient method to
counteract contaminants in groundwater and ultimately increase availability of
clean drinking water.