Prediction of mound geometry under recharge basins

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Abstract
A rising water table under a recharge basin or under a sanitary landfill presents health and engineering problems. Design of recharge facilities close to urban centers requires determination of the transient location of the water table in the general vicinity of a recharge site. This involves solution of the Laplace equation subject to appropriate boundary and initial conditions. Phreatic surface conditions with and without accretion are nonlinear and extremely complex. Solutions have been obtained either by the linearization of phreatic surface conditions or by the use of other simplifying assumptions. Such solutions are usually inapplicable in regions of steep hydraulic gradients. A general technique for computing the transient location of the water table mound under finite width longitudinal and circular recharge basins is presented, which avoids the need for any limiting assumption or linearization. Computations were carried out on the Control Data Corporation (CDC) 3300. The results are presented graphically in terms of dimensionless parameters. Comparisons with other known solutions are made wherever it is appropriate.