Scale Dependence of Soil Permeability to Air: Measurement Method and Field Investigation

Garbesi, Karina; Sextro, R.G.; Robinson, Allen L.; Wooley, J.; Owens, Jonathan A.; Nazaroff, William W.

doi:10.1029/95wr03637

Cited by 31 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 41 publications

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“…Pneumatic tests were conducted at multiple soil gas probes using a vacuum pump (November 2009, September 2010, and November 2010). The soil‐air permeability was estimated from the measured flow rate and pressure using the spherical flow model described in Garbesi et al (). Snow density was measured on core samples (March 2010, January 2011, and March 2011).…”

Section: Field Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Evaluation of Seasonal Factors on Petroleum Hydrocarbon Vapor Biodegradation and Intrusion Potential in a Cold Climate

Hers¹,

Jourabchi²,

Lahvis³

et al. 2014

Groundwater Monitoring Rem

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A detailed seasonal study of soil vapor intrusion at a cold climate site with average yearly temperature of 1.9 °C was conducted at a house with a crawlspace that overlay a shallow dissolved‐phase petroleum hydrocarbon (gasoline) plume in North Battleford, Saskatchewan, Canada. This research was conducted primarily to assess if winter conditions, including snow/frost cover, and cold soil temperatures, influence aerobic biodegradation of petroleum vapors in soil and the potential for vapor intrusion. Continuous time‐series data for oxygen, pressure differentials, soil temperature, soil moisture, and weather conditions were collected from a high‐resolution monitoring network. Seasonal monitoring of groundwater, soil vapor, crawlspace air, and indoor air was also undertaken. Petroleum hydrocarbon vapor attenuation and biodegradation rates were not significantly reduced during low temperature winter months and there was no evidence for a significant capping effect of snow or frost cover that would limit oxygen ingress from the atmosphere. In the residual light nonaqueous phase liquid (LNAPL) source area adjacent to the house, evidence for biodegradation included rapid attenuation of hydrocarbon vapor concentrations over a vertical interval of approximately 0.9 m, and a corresponding decrease in oxygen to less than 1.5% v/v. In comparison, hydrocarbon vapor concentrations above the dissolved plume and below the house were much lower and decreased sharply within a few tens of centimeters above the groundwater source. Corresponding oxygen concentrations in soil gas were at least 10% v/v. A reactive transport model (MIN3P‐DUSTY) was initially calibrated to data from vertical profiles at the site to obtain biodegradation rates, and then used to simulate the observed soil vapor distribution. The calibrated model indicated that soil vapor transport was dominated by diffusion and aerobic biodegradation, and that crawlspace pressures and soil gas advection had little influence on soil vapor concentrations.

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Section: Field Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Evaluation of Seasonal Factors on Petroleum Hydrocarbon Vapor Biodegradation and Intrusion Potential in a Cold Climate

Hers¹,

Jourabchi²,

Lahvis³

et al. 2014

Groundwater Monitoring Rem

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“…Transport properties upscaling has been investigated by simulating flow through numerically generated random porous media, assuming a specific (usually lognormal) permeability distribution [e.g., Gelhar and Axness , 1983; Ababou et al , 1989]. Concurrently, efforts have been expended to estimate the scaling properties and the distribution of permeability in geomaterials and geologic formations [e.g., Brace , 1980; Goggin et al , 1992; Garbesi et al , 1996; Painter , 1996; Schulze‐Makuch et al , 1999]. Recent laboratory studies [ Henriette et al , 1989; Tidwell and Wilson , 1997, 1999a, 1999b, 2000] attempted to quantify the spatial fluctuations of permeability in meter‐scale blocks as a function of measurement volume (see also Zhang et al [2000] who examined centimeter‐scale samples).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Permeability fluctuations in heterogeneous networks with different dimensionality and topology

2003

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[1] The purpose of this work was to relate the spatial fluctuations and scaling properties of the transport properties of porous rocks to their underlying pore geometry. Our approach was to numerically simulate flow through networks of pipes with randomly prescribed radii. The permeability k and inverse formation factor 1/F were calculated in a large number of network realizations of varying size and degree of heterogeneity (i.e., the width of the pipe radius distribution). We generally observed a large decrease of the ensemble arithmetic averages of k and 1/F with increasing network size (i.e., negative scale effect). Conversely, the ensemble geometric averages showed a moderate positive scale effect in three-dimensional simple cubic networks. We also found that in networks smaller than 32 Â 32 or 10 Â 10 Â 10, the ensemble standard deviations of k and 1/F had a power law dependence on network size (defined as the total number of pipes) with an exponent a varying from À0.5 in homogeneous networks to large negative values depending on lattice topology in highly heterogeneous ones (Àa increased with increasing lattice connectiveness, i.e., with coordination number). Thus at small scales the network transport properties were characterized by a nonuniversal power law scaling. At larger scales we observed a transition to a presumably ''universal'' power law scaling with an exponent equal to À0.5 independently on the degree of heterogeneity, dimensionality and lattice topology. Comparing our results to published experimental data, we found a good agreement, except in cases where we suspect that the small-scale measurements suffered a significant bias (indicated by non-nested distributions at increasing scales). We speculate that the strong positive scale effect generally observed in nature is also caused by sampling bias at small scales.

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“…Sisson and Wierenga (1981) showed that 5‐, 25‐, and 127‐cm‐diameter rings gave similar mean infiltration rates, although the mean increased from 6.25 to 8.48 and 8.51 cm d −1 Davis et al (1999) compared constant‐head well permeameter, 6‐ by 7‐cm cores, and 20‐ by 30‐cm cores, and found that the largest core size gave estimates from one to three orders of magnitude greater than the other two methods. Air permeability measurements have been similarly shown to be scale dependent, with estimates increasing as much as a factor of 20 when the scale of measurement increased from 0.1 to 2 m (e.g., Garbesi et al, 1996; Tidwell and Wilson, 1999).…”

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confidence: 99%

Bias in Ponded Infiltration Estimates Due to Sample Volume and Shape

Wuest

2005

Vadose Zone Journal

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with estimates increasing as much as a factor of 20 when the scale of measurement increased from 0.1 to 2 m (e.g., Estimates of saturated and unsaturated water flow in soil are impor- Garbesi et al., 1996;Tidwell and Wilson, 1999). tant for predictions of infiltration, runoff, and solute transport. Previ-Measurement bias related to sample size has someous research indicates that ponded infiltration estimates are influenced by the volume or cross-sectional area of the measurement. Our study times been attributed to smaller samples having less probcompared quasi-steady infiltration measurements made using 20-, 30-, ability of encountering spatially infrequent, high magniand 45-cm-diameter cylinders driven 25 cm deep into 56 field plots tude portions of the soil (Iverson et al., 2001; Starr et al., under diverse agricultural management practices. Mean infiltration 1995). As pointed out by Sisson and Wierenga (1981), rate increased from 50, to 81, to 95 mm h Ϫ1 as diameter increased. however, this would be a violation of the central limit Standard deviation and range also increased with diameter. All three theorem, since the mean of randomly selected samples diameters produced lognormal data distributions. These results indishould be centered on the same value regardless of their cate that increasing the sample area is not equivalent to pooling of sample volume. If a sufficient number of small-volume many smaller samples, which would have produced the same mean but samples are used, the mean should be equivalent to that with a lower variance. Follow-up experiments with a double-ring configuration or a divider placed in the center of a 45-cm cylinder demon-of larger samples. In terms of the variance, large-volume strated that adding vertical barriers reduced infiltration even when samples should be equivalent to pooling small samples, the total infiltration area was unchanged. A pulse of dye introduced unless the measurement technique creates artifacts de-10 min before removing the ponded water showed an extensive netpendent on the volume or dimensions of the sample. To work of dyed flow pathways in all but the slowest infiltration situaaccount for the decrease in infiltration measured with tions. The pathways were not associated with visible macropores. smaller infiltration rings, Shouse et al. (1994) suggested Careful consideration should be given to the dimensions of samples that a stagnation zone (an artifact of the measurement used to estimate saturated and possibly unsaturated flow from infiltechnique) was introduced when partitions were driven tration experiments.

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Scale Dependence of Soil Permeability to Air: Measurement Method and Field Investigation

Cited by 31 publications

References 41 publications

Evaluation of Seasonal Factors on Petroleum Hydrocarbon Vapor Biodegradation and Intrusion Potential in a Cold Climate

Evaluation of Seasonal Factors on Petroleum Hydrocarbon Vapor Biodegradation and Intrusion Potential in a Cold Climate

Permeability fluctuations in heterogeneous networks with different dimensionality and topology

Bias in Ponded Infiltration Estimates Due to Sample Volume and Shape

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