An aquifer is a lithological unit or combination of such units which has appreciably greater water transmissibility than adjacent units. It stores and transmits water, commonly recoverable in economically usable quantities. Impervious layers or beds of very low permeability which bound an aquifer are termed confining or aquicludes (e.g. the two shale horizons confining a porous sandstone). Any rock of low porosity and permeability is termed an aquitard. An aquitard is one so impervious that it neither stores nor transmits water (Shaw, 1994).
The yield or capacity of an aquifer is termed its storage coefficient, which is defined as the volume of water released or taken into storage per unit surface area, per unit change in the component of head normal to the surface of the aquifer (Chow, 1964). In the case of an unconfined aquifer, the storage coefficient is equal to the specific yield (Price, 1996).
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Chow, Ven Te, 1964. Handbook of Applied Hydrology, McGraw-Hill, New York., 1445pp.
Price, M., 1996. Introducing Groundwater, Second edition Chapman & Hall, London.
Shaw, E.M., 1994. Hydrology in Practice, Second edition, Chapman & Hall, London.
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© 1998 Kluwer Academic Publishers
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Schreiber, C. (1998). Aquifer . In: Encyclopedia of Hydrology and Lakes. Encyclopedia of Earth Science. Springer, Dordrecht . https://doi.org/10.1007/1-4020-4497-6_17
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/1-4020-4497-6_17
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