Award For Creativity in Engineering for Melinda Salisbury

The proposed project is to examine the effects that partially penetrating wells and ellipsoidal inhomogeneities have on the three-dimensional capture zone. The results of this project will help determine whether modeled pump-out systems are actually performing as predicted, for certain cases. Preliminary recommendations on improvement of pump-out system design could come out of this work. The most important issues to be explored are: 1) the importance to model wells as partially penetrating; 2) the relationship between the depth and width of the three-dimensional capture zone and the discharge rate of the partially penetrating well; 3) the effect that ellipsoidal inhomogeneities have on the width and depth of the capture zone of a partially penetrating well, as compared to the homogeneous aquifer. This work will be done for the purpose of developing more realistic and useful modeling techniques for use in pump-out system design. Development of engineering heuristics and tools will be the final outcome.