Ground-Water Mound Equation for Rectangular Recharge Area

Abstract

Artificial recharge of the ground-water table from rectangular basins has been the subject of extensive study in the last 30 years. Although, for finite aquifers, the ground-water mound profile can be accurately predicted, the generalization of finite-aquifer solutions does not hold for infinite aquifers. For an infinite aquifer, the ground-water mound profile has been obtained in the form involving a definite integral (Hantush's mound function). The definite integral has been tabulated for a certain range of arguments. However, to use this table, double interpolation is necessary, which increases the error. Furthermore, a tabular solution cannot be used for analytical purposes. Thus, there is a distinct lack of more useful and computationally preferred algebraic approximations of the definite integral. The present study offers an algebraic approximation of Hantush's mound function.