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Impact of a Storm-Water Infiltration Basin on the Recharge Dynamics in a Highly Permeable Aquifer

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Abstract

Infiltration basins are increasingly used worldwide to both mitigate flood risk in urban areas and artificially recharge shallow aquifers. Understanding recharge dynamics controlling the quantity and quality of infiltrating water is required to correctly design and maintain these facilities. In this paper, we focus on quantitative aspects and analyze in detail the temporal evolution of infiltration rates in basins overlying highly permeable aquifers. In these settings, recharge is a complex process due to high recharge rate and volume, undetected soil hydraulic heterogeneity and topsoil clogging. A 16-ha infiltration basin in Northern Italy has been intensively characterized and monitored for over four years. Field and laboratory tests were performed to characterize soil hydraulic properties. An unsaturated-saturated numerical model was implemented to obtain additional quantitative information supporting experimental data. Results show a strong impact of the infiltration basin on natural recharge patterns. When properly maintained (no clogging of topsoil), estimated infiltration rates from the bottom of the basin are about fifty times higher than recharge under natural conditions in the same area. When the infiltration basin is not properly maintained, bioclogging progressively diminishes the infiltration capacity of the basin, which turns to have no impact on aquifer recharge. Recharge patterns are highly erratic and difficult to predict. We observed natural recharge rates of the order of 1 m/h and a poor correlation between recharge times and maximum intensity of rainfall events. Due to the complex behavior of the recharge, the numerical model (based on the classical Richards equation) is able to explain many but not all the observed recharge events. Macropores flow and Lisse effects on piezometric measurements may be responsible for the disagreement between model predictions and observations.

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Acknowledgments

The Authors would like to gratefully thank Lamont Research Professor Leonardo Seeber, of Columbia Universitys Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, for his valuable comments and suggestions that helped to greatly improve our article. Thanks also to Prof. Giovanna della Porta, of Università degli Studi di Milano, for providing the image of Fig. 2b. A.S. is currently supported by funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (OPP1106427, 1032350) in the framework of the WorldPop Project (www.worldpop.org) and was affiliated with the Dipartimento di Scienze della Terra ’A. Desio’, Universit`a degli Studi di Milano when this study began. This study was partly funded by the Istituto Regionale di Ricerca della Lombardia (IReR 2008B053, 2009B002). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, and preparation of the manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Dipartimento di Scienze della Terra ’A. Desio’, Università degli Studi di Milano, Via Mangiagalli 34, 20133, Milan, Italy

    Marco Masetti, Stefania Stevenazzi & Federico Bacci

  2. Department of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences, University of British Columbia (UBC), 2207 Main Mall, Vancouver, (BC), V6T1Z4, Canada

    Daniele Pedretti

  3. Geography and Environment, University of Southampton, Highfield Campus, Shackleton Building 44, Southampton, SO17 1BJ, UK

    Alessandro Sorichetta

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  1. Marco Masetti
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  2. Daniele Pedretti
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  4. Stefania Stevenazzi
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  5. Federico Bacci
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Correspondence to Marco Masetti.

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Masetti, M., Pedretti, D., Sorichetta, A. et al. Impact of a Storm-Water Infiltration Basin on the Recharge Dynamics in a Highly Permeable Aquifer. Water Resour Manage 30, 149–165 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11269-015-1151-3

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