An experimental investigation was conducted to evaluate the three‐phase fluid distribution caused by a petroleum spill in an unconfined aquifer. The experiment consisted of introducing oil at the top of a vertical column of soil containing water and measuring the oil and water contents at various elevations and times. The static fluid distribution was then compared to the calculated distribution based on two‐phase capillary pressure versus saturation data obtained by a separate laboratory experiment. It was concluded that the water saturation at static equilibrium can be estimated satisfactorily by assuming it is a function of the capillary pressure between oil and water.
One of the most common methods of artificial recharge to the ground water is from basins. In this paper, seven analytical solutions that describe artificial recharge from basins are presented. Most of these solutions are derived by directly solving the general partial differential equation for ground water flow. The solutions differ in that they use different boundary conditions, basin shapes, and consider the nonlinearity of the artificial recharge problem differently. Use of each analytical solution is demonstrated in this paper by application to an example problem. A comparison of each analytical solution presented in this paper was made to give suggestions on their use, their ease of implementation, and their relative agreement. Although no attempt is made in the paper to conclude which analytical solution is best for all problems, some general conclusions can be stated on the applicability of the various analytical solutions. Of the analytical solutions presented in this paper, Glovers and Hantush's solutions for rectangular recharge basins are highly recommended. Baumanns solution for a circular basin also gave fairly reliable results and is very easy to evaluate numerically.
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