Water Table Fluctuations Observed Using Time-lapse Ground Penetrating Radar Coupled with Spatial Modeling
Abstract
Time-lapse Ground Penetrating Radar (4-D GPR) offers a quick, inexpensive, and valuable tool for characterizing water table fluctuations on both spatial and temporal scales. 4-D GPR has the potential to reduce the number of monitoring wells required to characterize hydrogeologic phenomena, such as fluctuations in the water table. Quantitative and qualitative information can be found when 4-D GPR is coupled with other tests such as tracers. This applied study used 4-D GPR coupled with spatial modeling to characterize temporal and spatial water table fluctuations in a glacial setting near Alma, Michigan. The glacial outwash study area provided high resolution 4-D GPR data acquired using a 200 MHz monostatic radar system over the course of 960 hours in an area adjacent to the Pine River on flat terrain. The GPR data obtained along the Pine River was then interpreted by identifying water table reflections and interpolating these into grids. Surface maps were created that represent water table surfaces for each time interval in the study, which were then differenced to account for temporal water table fluctuations. Differences found within the GPR data were validated, using a static water level test. The water table elevation from the static water level test highly correlated with the depth of the reflector, which was expected to represent the water table in the GPR data. Thus, differences seen within the GPR data represent spatial and temporal fluctuations of the water table. This study showed that 4-D GPR can be used to characterize spatial and temporal water table fluctuations.
- Publication:
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AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2006
- Bibcode:
- 2006AGUFM.H31B1413M
- Keywords:
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- 1829 Groundwater hydrology;
- 1835 Hydrogeophysics;
- 1894 Instruments and techniques: modeling;
- 1895 Instruments and techniques: monitoring