Finite volume/mixed finite element analysis of pollutant transport and bioremediation in heterogeneous saturated aquifers

The adoption of a suitable pumping–injecting well network and the human enhancement of the activity of soil bacteria, whose metabolism contributes to degrade and transform many pollutants in non-toxic substances, may be crucial in the process of remediation of contaminated soils. Organic contaminant transport in a subsurface aquifer and its biological degradation kinetics is numerically addressed by using a four contaminant species model. A numerical approach is proposed, that is based on a cell-centre finite volume method for the system of advection–dispersion equations of contaminants with a mixed-hybrid finite element method for the solution of a single-phase Darcy's equation. The effectiveness of the method and its accuracy in retaining the main physical properties of the continuous mathematical model is illustrated by simulating the time evolution of contaminant concentrations in a set of realistic scenarios. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

[1]  Stewart W. Taylor,et al.  Substrate and biomass transport in a porous medium , 1990 .

[2]  F. Molz,et al.  Simulation of Microbial Growth Dynamics Coupled to Nutrient and Oxygen Transport in Porous Media , 1986 .

[3]  Philippe G. Ciarlet,et al.  The finite element method for elliptic problems , 2002, Classics in applied mathematics.

[4]  Michael A. Celia,et al.  Contaminant transport and biodegradation: 2. Conceptual model and test simulations , 1989 .

[5]  Gianmarco Manzini,et al.  A fully coupled numerical model for two-phase flow with contaminant transport and biodegradation kinetics , 2001 .

[6]  Gianmarco Manzini,et al.  2-D Numerical Modeling of Bioremediation in Heterogeneous Saturated Soils , 1998 .

[7]  Philippe C. Baveye,et al.  An evaluation of mathematical models of the transport of biologically reacting solutes in saturated soils and aquifers , 1989 .

[8]  W. Kelly,et al.  Kinetics of BTX biodegradation and mineralization in batch and column systems , 1996 .

[9]  Gianmarco Manzini,et al.  A mixed finite element/finite volume approach for solving biodegradation transport in groundwater , 1998 .

[10]  B. Herrling,et al.  Modeling of biologically mediated redox processes in the subsurface , 1994 .

[11]  Jean E. Roberts,et al.  A unified physical presentation of mixed, mixed-hybrid finite elements and standard finite difference approximations for the determination of velocities in waterflow problems , 1991 .

[12]  George M. Fix,et al.  HYBRID FINITE ELEMENT METHODS , 1976 .

[13]  Fred J. Molz,et al.  A numerical transport model for oxygen‐ and nitrate‐based respiration linked to substrate and nutrient availability in porous media , 1988 .

[14]  David F. Ollis,et al.  Biochemical Engineering Fundamentals , 1976 .