Title: Efficiency of the groundwater artificial recharge from dam water release in arid area

Authors: Zouheira Ibn Ali; Asma Ahmed Gharbi; Amjad Kallel; Lamia Laajili Ghzel; Moncef Zairi

Addresses: Water, Energy and Environment Laboratory (LR3E), National School of Engineering of Sfax (ENIS), University of Sfax, Sfax3038, Tunisia ' Water, Energy and Environment Laboratory (LR3E), National School of Engineering of Sfax (ENIS), University of Sfax, Sfax3038, Tunisia ' Water, Energy and Environment Laboratory (LR3E), National School of Engineering of Sfax (ENIS), University of Sfax, Sfax3038, Tunisia ' Higher School of Agriculture, University of Carthage, Mograne, Mograne 1121, Zaghouan, Tunisia ' Water, Energy and Environment Laboratory (LR3E), National School of Engineering of Sfax (ENIS), University of Sfax, Sfax3038, Tunisia

Abstract: This paper describes a methodology to estimate the groundwater artificial recharge efficiency. The water table fluctuation method (WTF), stream-flow (SF) estimation method and Hydrus-1D model are used to estimate the effective water quantity reaching the aquifer. The efficiency of the stream flooding on groundwater level trend was discussed based on groundwater table fluctuation. The comparison between the three methods is found to be valuable for determining the range of plausible recharge amounts and for highlighting the uncertainty of the estimates. SF method yields the largest recharge estimate whereas the WTF method provides actual recharge reaching the aquifer. SF method and Hydrus-1D model show the best fit between estimated recharge volume and water volume released with a coefficient-of-determination (R2) of 0.9 and 0.8, respectively. The combination of the stream flow with water-table fluctuations methods is recommended to increase the constancy of recharge estimates and preliminary assessment.

Keywords: artificial recharge; assessment; stream infiltration; groundwater; water level.

DOI: 10.1504/IJW.2019.097312

International Journal of Water, 2019 Vol.13 No.1, pp.12 - 25

Received: 02 Dec 2017
Accepted: 29 Jun 2018

Published online: 14 Jan 2019 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article