How heterogeneity of the K-field influences a heat plume in a shallow alluvial aquifer: responses from a heat tracer test

Simultaneous solute and heat tracer test provides essential information for a reliable assessment of low temperature geothermal systems. The actual efficiency of ‘open systems’, including heat storage projects, is strongly affected by the heterogeneity of the hydraulic conductivity field (K-field). It could be also useful for assessing the cumulative impacts of numerous projects in urban areas on the groundwater resources.
Using field data from a solute and heat tracer test conducted in the alluvial aquifer of the Meuse River (Belgium), an inverse problem of parameter estimation is solved. The tracing experiment consisted in simultaneously injecting heated water and a dye tracer in a piezometer and monitoring the evolution of groundwater temperature and tracer concentration in the recovery well and in monitoring wells. To get insights in the 3D characteristics of the heat plume, an arrangement of three transects of observation wells was used.
The breakthrough curves measured in the recovery well showed that heat transfer in the alluvial aquifer is slower and more dispersive than solute transport. Recovery is very low for heat while in the same time it is measured as relatively high for the solute tracer. This is due to the fact that heat transport is a thermal diffusion dominated process. For conditions corresponding to high Peclet numbers, the hydraulic conductivity is the primary calibration parameter for predicting heat plume distribution. Heat diffusion is larger than molecular diffusion, implying that exchange between groundwater and the porous medium matrix is far more significant for heat than for solute tracers.