Hydrogeology

ES-405
ES-405 Hydrogeology 2-Credits
Hydrogeology & Geohydrology, Aquifer and their types including water-table,
confined, Leaky, and semi unconfined, Methods for reorganization and
management of aquifer system , Hydrological properties of rocks and their
measurements including porosity, permeability, intrinsic permeability,
hydraulic conductivity, specific capacity, specific storage etc. Effect of
geology in groundwater movement, Darcy law and its application, Recharge
and discharge areas of groundwater, Tube well drilling techniques, Designing
& development of tube well, Pumping test analysis to find the hydraulic
properties of different aquifers, Step draw down test, Refraction of flow
lines, Flow net analysis for isotropic and anisotropic media.
Books Recommended
1. Lin, Y. F. F. (2014). Hydrogeology: Objectives, Methods, and Applications.
2. Gilli,É., Mangan, C., &Mudry, J. (2012). Hydrogeology: Objectives, Methods,
Applications. CRC Press.
3. Brassington, R. (2007). Field hydrogeology. John Wiley & Sons.
4. Kresic, N. (2006). Hydrogeology and groundwater modeling. CRC press.
5. Todd, D. K., & Mays, L. W. (2005). Groundwater hydrology edition. Wiley, New Jersey.
6. Fetter, C. W., & Fetter, C. W. (2001). Applied hydrogeology (Vol. 3, No. 3). Upper
Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.Press.
Hydrogeology …………….?

Geohydrology………………?
Importance and Distribution of
Earth’s Water
Importance and Distribution of
Earth’s Water
Water is a vital natural resource and essential for
existence of life, all the economic and social activities are
dependent upon the water.
About 97.5% of Earth’s water is saline water and only
2.5% is fresh water. In 97.5% about 96.5% consist of oceans
and 1% consist of saline groundwater and saline lakes.
Whereas in 2.5% freshwater more than 68% water is locked up
in glaciers and ice caps and another 30% of freshwater is on
the ground. Only a little more than 1.2% of all freshwater is
surface water.
In case of surface freshwater, most of this water is
locked up in ground ice, and another 20.9% is found in lakes.
Rivers make up 0.49% of surface freshwater.
 Groundwater and its occurrence
Groundwater: is water located beneath the ground surface in
soil pore spaces and in the fractures of lithologic formations.
Groundwater can be found at nearly every point in the Earth's
shallow subsurface, to some degree; although aquifers do not
necessarily contain fresh water.

The Earth's crust can be divided into two regions:

The saturated zone (its study is called hydrogeology) ,
where all available spaces are filled with water OR the
subsurface zone in which all rock openings are filled with
water.

The unsaturated zone (its study is called geohydrology)

, where there are still pockets of air with some water that
can be replaced by water.
Water table: the upper surface of the zone of saturation.
Vadose zone: a subsurface zone in which rock openings are
generally unsaturated and filled partly with air and partly with
water; above the saturated zone. Above the water table
unsaturated region is called the vadose zone.
Capillary fringe: a transition zone with
higher moisture content at the base of
the vadose zone just above the water
table. OR The capillary fringe is the
subsurface layer in which groundwater
seeps up from a water table by capillary
action to fill pores.
Factors affecting the flow of ground water:
Slope of the water table - the steeper the water table, the
faster ground water moves.
Porosity and Permeability - if rock pores are small and
poorly connected, water moves slowly; when openings are large
and well connected, the flow of water is more rapid.
What is Groundwater?
 Aquifer, Aquitard and Aquifuge
Aquifer- Geologic unit that can store (porosity) and transmit (permeability)
significant quantities of water. OR
A formation, group of formations, or part of a formation that
contains sufficient saturated, permeable material to yield significant
quantities of water to wells.
When an aquifer is "capped" by a confining layer it cause the water to be
pressurized. This forces the water out of a well without pumping. This would
be called an artesian well.
e.g. Sandstone, Conglomerate, Well-jointed limestone, Sand and gravel,
Highly fractured volcanic rock.
All aquifers have two fundamental characteristics:
i. A capacity for groundwater storage (Porosity ) and;
ii. A capacity for groundwater flow (Permeability).
The amount of water a material can hold depends upon its
porosity. The size and degree of interconnection of those openings
(permeability) determine the materials’ ability to transmit fluid.
Aquitard - A confining bed that retards but does not prevent the flow of
water to or from an adjacent aquifer. Aquitard is slightly impervious layer
which can absorb some water and slowly transmit it. OR
A water-saturated sediment or rock whose permeability is so low it
cannot transmit any useful amount of water. OR
An aquitard is a zone within the earth that restricts the flow of
groundwater from one aquifer to another. OR
A water bearing layer of rock or sediment that transmits small
quantities of water in relation to aquifer.
e.g. sandy clay, unfractured crystalline rocks.
Aquiclude (impermeable layer) - A hydrogeologic unit which, although porous
and capable of storing water, does not transmit it at rates sufficient to
furnish an appreciable supply for a well. E.g clay
Aquiclude and aquitard are very similar and often used
interchangeably.
Aquifuge - An aquifuge is a geologic formation which doesn’t have
interconnected pores. It is neither porous nor permeable. Thus, it can
neither store water nor transmit it. Examples of aquifuge are rocks like
basalt, granite, etc. without fissures (long fine cracks).
Aquifers
— Aquifer: A formation, that contains sufficient saturated,
permeable material to yield significant quantities of water to
wells and springs.

Types of Aquifers
 •Unconfined aquifer(Water-table aquifer)
 — •Confined aquifer(Artesian aquifer)
 — Semi confined aquifer.
Unconfined Aquifer

•An aquifer that is close to the ground surface, with continuous layers
of materials of high intrinsic permeability extending from the land
surface to the base of the aquifer.

•Recharge from downward seepage through the unsaturated zone,

lateral ground water flow, or upward seepage from underlying strata.

Confined Aquifer

•An aquifer that are overlain by a confining layer.

•Recharge occurs in recharge area, where the aquifer crops out, or by

slow downward leakage through a leaky confining layer.

•Potentiometric surfaces the surface representative of the level to which

water will rise in a well cased to the aquifer
 Example Layered Aquifer System
14

Bedient et al., 1999.

Artesian Wells
A well whose source of water is a confined
aquifer•
The water level in artesian wells is at some height
above the water • table due to the pressure of the
aquifer
 Other Aquifer Features
16
Perched Aquifer
Perched Aquifer - aquifer in the vadose zone because of a
lens of impermeable material
- common in glacial outwash (clay from ponds), volcanic
deposits .
the top of a body of ground water separated from the
main water table beneath it by a zone that is not saturated
Artesian zone: The artesian zone is a complex
system of interconnected voids that can
discharge water to the surface (stream).
Artesian well: Water may rise to a level above
the top of a confined aquifer, producing an
artesian well. OR
A well in which water rises above the
aquifer is called artesian well.
 Recharge and Discharge Area
Recharge Areas: Areas where water enters the
saturated zone are called recharge areas,
because the saturated zone is recharged with
groundwater beneath these areas.
Discharge Areas: Areas where groundwater
reaches the surface (lakes, streams, swamps
and springs) are called discharge areas,
because the water is discharged from the
saturated zone.
Generally, recharge areas are greater
than discharge areas. 22
Recharge and Discharge Area
PROPERTIES OF
AQUIFERS
Properties of aquifer
Porosity
Porosity: the percentage of rock or sediment that
consists of voids or openings.
porous: a rock that holds much water
Porosity
Effective Porosity
Effective porosity is the fraction of the
porosity that is available for transporting
water (excludes fraction of pores too small
to hold water, or those that are not
interconnected

- can be measured in the lab directly by

saturating a dried sample of known volume
and measuring water uptake in a sealed
chamber over time

- for unconsolidated coarse-grained

sediments there is no significant difference
Porosity of Sedimentary Rocks

•Primary porosity
•Pores between grains

••Secondary porosity

•Fractures
Permeability

permeability: the capacity of a rock to transmit a

fluid such as water or petroleum through pores and
fractures
permeable: a rock that allows water to flow easily
through it
impermeable: a rock that does not allow water to
flow through it easily
Specific Yield (Sy)

— •Specific Yield Sy the ratio of the

volume of water that drains from a
saturated geomaterial owing to the
attraction of gravity to the total
volume of the geomaterial
Specific Retention (Sr)

•Specific retention Sr the ratio of the volume

of water a geomaterial can retain against
gravity drainage to the total volume of the
geomaterial.
n = Sy+ Sr
 In hydrogeological studies, the specific yield concept is more important than
porosity, since the latter does not give any clue of water abstraction from
aquifers. For instance, in igneous rocks, porosity is not more than 2% but they
yield all the available water in their voids up to approximately 100%. On the
contrary, clays have the maximum porosity but they yield less than 5% of
stored water.
 If a granular material with an average porosity of 30% exists below the water
table, its voids are saturated containing 30% water per unit volume. If the
water table is lowered, the soil will eventually give up about two-thirds of its
water, equivalent to 20% of the total volume. The remaining 10% water by
volume is held by surface tension. In hydrological terminology, one says that
the specific yield is 0.2 and specific retention is 0.1.
 Storativity

Storativity (S) or Storage coefficient

•The volume of water that a permeable unit
will absorb or expel from storage per unit
surface area per unit change in head.

Storativity
Confined aquifer
S = b Ss

Unconfined aquifer
S = Sy+ b Ss
Specific storage is the volume of water that a unit volume of aquifer
(or aquitard) releases from storage under a unit decline in head. Specific
storage is related to the compressibility's of water and the aquifer (or
aquitard) as follows:

Ss=ρg(α+nβ)
where ρ is mass density of water (= 1000 kg/m³) [M/L³], g is
gravitational acceleration (= 9.8 m/sec²) [L/T²], α is aquifer (or
aquitard) compressibility [T²L/M], n is total porosity [dimensionless],
and β is compressibility of water (= 4.4×10-10 m sec²/kg ) [T²L/M].
The following table provides representative values of specific
storage for various geologic materials (Domenico and Mifflin
[1965] as reported in Batu [1998]):

Material Ss (ft-1)
Plastic clay 7.8×10-4 to 6.2×10-3
Stiff clay 3.9×10-4 to 7.8×10-4
Medium hard clay 2.8×10-4 to 3.9×10-4
Loose sand 1.5×10-4 to 3.1×10-4
Dense sand 3.9×10-5 to 6.2×10-5
Dense sandy gravel 1.5×10-5 to 3.1×10-5
Rock, fissured 1×10-6 to 2.1×10-5
Rock, sound < 1×10-6

To Convert Divide By To Obtain

ft-1 0.3048 m-1
Freeze and Cherry (1979) provided the
following compressibility values for various aquifer
materials:

Material Compressibility, α (m2/N or Pa-1)

Clay 10-8 to 10-6
Sand 10-9 to 10-7
Gravel 10-10 to 10-8
Jointed rock 10-10 to 10-8
Sound rock 10-11 to 10-9

Pa-1 = m2/N = m sec2/kg

 E X A M P L E P O R O S I T Y C A L C U LAT I O N
S
A loose soil sample of 45 cm3 is collected from the field. It is
poured into a graduated cylindrical cup and then filled with water. It
is determined that 25.2 cm3 of water is in the voids. What is the
porosity of this soil?
 If 0.5 m3 of sand with porosity 0.23 is mixed with 1.1 m3 of gravel of
0.32 porosity, what will be the porosity of the mixture?
 Hydraulic Conductivity
Hydraulic conductivity is one of the parameters, which tells about the transmission properties of an aquifer.
It depends upon the specific yield (effective porosity) of the aquifer, which means the degree of
interconnection of the pores. It can be defined as the volume of water per unit time passing through per unit
cross-sectional area of the aquifer under the effect of unit hydraulic gradient as shown in Figure 2.19.
dimension is [L3/T/L2] but generally written as L/T, which is equivalent to the velocity dimension in
physics.
Under the light of this definition, one can write notationally the hydraulic conductivity,
K, as, K = Q/ Ai

where Q is the discharge, A is the cross-sectional area, and i is the hydraulic gradient. Hydraulic
conductivity is a property that describes the ease with which water can move through the
interconnected void spaces. Table 2.6 presents the hydraulic conductivity classification. Values are for
typical fresh groundwater conditions using standard values of viscosity and specific gravity for water at 20
C and 1 atm (Bear, 1979)
 Applied Hydrogeology
C.W. Fetter

Chapter: 3 (Properties of Aquifer)

 When pumping rate in both wells is same
Shape of cone of depression…..?
Slope of cone of depression in both wells…?
DARCY’S LAW
The law of flow of water through soil was first studied by Darcy in 1856.
We can compute the discharge of aquifer.
The Darcy’s law is,

“The velocity is directly proportional to the change in head

and inversely proportional to the distance b/w the two heads.”
Depends upon hydraulic conductivity
Distance b/w source wells
Head difference
i.e. V is directly proportional to h2-h1 ( ∆h )
V is directly proportional to 1/ ∆l
V is directly proportional to ∆h / ∆l
V=
He used and inclined cylinder filled with sand,
and inject some non-quantity of water at one end.
Two piezometers P1 and P2 are installed in the
cylinder at the two ends to measure the depth of
water table or the hydraulic head at each
piezometer. In order to install piezometers we
have to puncture the cylinder, which is under
pressure, if the sand has water in it then it will
rise in piezometers. Water moves through pores
of sand from left to right.

Height of first piezometer from datum plane is Z1

and height of second piezometer is Z2. Head of
first piezometer is h1 and of second is h2.
Where k is hydraulic conductivity of material which is
the property of material and also dependent of the
property of fluid. As we know that discharge velocity is :
V=Q/A comparing with Darcy's velocity

V=Q/A = -K dh/dl
Q= -K A dh/dl
Thus Q= -KiA where i=dh/dl

where i is the hydraulic gradient b/w two hydraulic heads.

DARCY’S LAW IN 2-D AND 3-D

Generally Darcy's law can be written in form of vector as:

V= -K dh/dl ( the negative sign shows that the
gradient is decreasing )

Darcy’s law can also be expressed in 3-D or in vector

form.
V=Vxi + Vyj + Vzk = i( -K dh/dx ) + j(-K
dh/dy ) + k(-K dh/dz )
We always consider groundwater in 2-D so we convert 3-D
equation in 2-D i.e. horizontal flow x-axis and vertical flow y-
axis by using Dupit Assumption, which states that:
There is no flow and head losses in z-direction(in isotropic
condition) or
∂h/ ∂z =0 and Vz=0.
Hence the equation reduces to
V=Vxi + Vyj = i( -K dh/dx ) + j(-K dh/dy )
Now if our aquifer is isotropic then K1= K2 = K
V=Vxi + Vyj = -K (∂h/ ∂x i + ∂h/ ∂y j)
V=-K ∆h
If our aquifer is anisotropic then,
K1 is not equal to K2 so V is not equal to -K ∆h
ASSUMPTIONS OF DARCY’S LAW

The following assumptions are made in Darcy’s law.

The soil is saturated.

The flow through soil is laminar.

The flow is continuous and steady.

The total cross sectional area of soil mass is
considered.
 VALIDITY OF DARCY’S LAW
1. Darcy’s law is valid if the flow through soils is laminar:
The flow of water through soils depends upon the dimension of
particles. In fine grained soils the dimensions of the interstices (voids)
are very small and flow is necessarily laminar.
In course- grained soil, the flow is also laminar. However, in very
coarse grained soils, such as gravels, the flow may be turbulent.

2. It is valid for flow in clays, slits and fine sands. In coarse sands,
gravels and boulders, the flow may be turbulent and Darcy’s law may
not be applicable.

3. For Darcy’s law to be valid, the relationship between velocity (v) and
hydraulic gradient (i) should be linear.
 LAPLACE EQUATION
When subsurface aquifer is in steady state equation this
equation is used. It states that:
Head remains constant at a particular time of year and time
must be in years.
( Mass Balance Equation )

For a unit area V=Q

Replacing Q with V in above equation

( -kx ) + ( -ky ) + ( -kz ) = 0

Applying the Dupit Assumption no flow along the z-
axis

( -kx ) + ( -ky ) = 0

Assume the isotropic aquifer

=0 ( steady state condition )

h=0
FOR NON STEADY STATE CONDITION
OR TRANSIENT CONDITION
A is not equal to B so laplace equation can not be applied. For
example,some water will store in aquifer so the net result is not
zero, it is replaced by storavity.

B A

pumpage>recharge
When heads are not constant,there is fluctuation and time must
be in years. There is continuous drawdown so laplace equation
failed for it.
Pumping Test: A pumping test is a field experiment in which a well is pumped at a controlled
rate and water-level response (drawdown) is measured in one or more surrounding
observation wells and optionally in the pumped well (control well) itself; response data from
pumping tests are used to estimate the hydraulic properties of aquifers, evaluate well
performance and identify aquifer boundaries. Aquifer test and aquifer performance test (APT)
are alternate designations for a pumping test. In petroleum engineering, a pumping test is
referred to as a drawdown test.
The principle of a pumping test involves applying a stress to an aquifer by extracting
groundwater from a pumping well and measuring the aquifer response to that stress by
monitoring drawdown as a function of time. These measurements are then incorporated into
an appropriate well flow equation to calculate the hydraulic parameters of the aquifer.
Pumping test are carried out to determine:
 How much water can be extracted from a well based on long term yield and well
efficiency.
 Hydraulic properties of aquifer.
 Spatial effect of pumping on aquifer.
 Determine the suitable depth of pump.
 Information of water quality and its variability with time.

Thiem calculated to find the hydraulic properties by pumping test analysis. His
equation was for confined and unconfined aquifer and he assumed constant pumping rate and
equilibrium condition (steady state flow).
Then Theis (1935) also developed the equation for confined aquifer with constant pumping
rate and equilibrium condition assumptions. When Thiem developed the equation he did not
use the master curve but Theis use Thiem relation and develop a master curve.
Derivation of the Thiem Equation for
Confined Radial Flow
Darcy's law describes the flow of water through a saturated porous medium and
can be written as follows

Q = -KA dh/dl

where ‘A’ is the cross-sectional area through which the water flows, ‘r’ is
distance along the ground-water flow path (in this case, radial distance). As
shown in figure, the area (A) through which flow occurs is
A = 2πrb
where ‘b’ is the thickness of the completely confined aquifer. Substituting
this expression for ‘A’ into Darcy's law gives:

Q = -2πrbK dh/dl

For steady flow, Q, the constant quantity of water pumped from the well, is
also the flow rate through any cylindrical shell around the well.
This equation can be solved by separating variables and integrating
both sides of the equation. Separation of variables gives:
There are two observation wells;
Head is h1 at a distance r1 from the pumping well
Head is h2 at a distance r2 from the pumping well