Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Identifier

6655

Sagar Pandit

Date

2020

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science

Major

Civil Engineering

Concentration

Water Resources Engineering

Committee Chair

Claudio Meier

Committee Member

Scott Schoefernacker

Committee Member

Brian Waldron

Committee Member

Daniel Larsen

Abstract

Inter-aquifer exchanges due to breaches in the confining clay layer can potentially contaminate the Memphis aquifer, as lesser-quality waters permeate from the unconfined aquifer. Losing river reaches could indicate breach locations, as these should depress water-table locally, resulting in downward vertical exchange fluxes (VEFs) along nearby streambeds. A spatial analysis of seepage meter measurements performed along the Wolf River identified three potentially losing sub-reaches, where VEFs were studied at a finer scale, using multiple point-scale methods. Results were mixed, displaying large spatial variability, possibly due to mismatches between the process and observation scales. Differential stream gaging was conducted to assess losses integrally over sub-reaches, confirming one losing location; however, comparing groundwater river stages suggested gaining conditions at this location. Pinpointing losing reaches using point-scale methods is difficult due to the disparity of scales. Effective methodologies are needed that comply with the scale of the problem.

Comments

Data is provided by the student.

Library Comment

Dissertation or thesis originally submitted to the local University of Memphis Electronic Theses & dissertation (ETD) Repository.

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