INFILTRATION

T.P.A. Ferré , A.W. Warrick , in Encyclopedia of Soils in the Environment, 2005

Introduction

Infiltration is defined every bit the flow of water from aboveground into the subsurface. The topic of infiltration has received a great deal of attention because of its importance to topics as widely ranging as irrigation, contaminant transport, groundwater recharge, and ecosystem viability. More mostly, a quantitative understanding of this process is vital to our ability to relate surface and subsurface processes in describing the hydrologic cycle.

While the definition of infiltration is simple, information technology tin can involve all aspects of catamenia through a variably saturated porous medium, ranging in complexity from steady-state, saturated catamenia in a homogeneous, isotropic medium to transient, unstable, unsaturated flow through an anisotropic, heterogeneous medium. The charge per unit and pattern of infiltration vary with the distribution and rate with which water is supplied at the footing surface, the depth of the water table, the hydraulic properties of the subsurface materials, and the antecedent wet content distribution. The post-obit discussion focuses on infiltration into a homogeneous, isotropic medium every bit a ground for agreement the infiltration process.

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Infiltration

Yard.B. Kirkham , in Principles of Soil and Found Water Relations (Second Edition), 2014

13.1 Definition of Infiltration

Infiltration rate may be defined every bit the meters per unit fourth dimension of water entering into the soil regardless of the types or values of forces or gradients. The term hydraulic conductivity, which has been defined as the meters per mean solar day of water seeping into the soil under the pull of gravity or nether a unit hydraulic gradient, should not exist confused with infiltration rate. Infiltration rate need not refer to saturated conditions. If two raindrops of total volume 2   mmiii  =   0.000002   mthree fall per day on a square meter of soil and are absorbed into the soil, the infiltration charge per unit is 0.000002   m/day.

Water entry into soil is acquired by matric and gravitational forces. Therefore, this entry may occur in the lateral and upward directions every bit well as the downward one (Baver et al., 1972, p. 365). Infiltration normally refers to the downward movement. The matric force ordinarily predominates over the gravitational strength during the early stages of water entry into soil, so that observations made during the early on stages of infiltration are valid when considering the absenteeism of gravity.

If water infiltrates into a dry soil, a definite wetting front, also chosen a wet forepart, can be observed. This is the purlieus betwixt the wetted upper office of the soil and the dry lower role of the soil. If water is infiltrating into soil contained in a articulate plastic column, one can observe the progress of the wet front and marker wet fronts as they change with time (Figure 13.one). Now, it is incommunicable to measure out the matric potential exactly at the wet front, because information technology progresses too rapidly into the soil. However, one can measure the amount of h2o infiltrated and the depth and shape of the moisture forepart, and come to important conclusions about the entry of water into the soil. Infiltration is extremely important, because it determines not only the amount of water that will enter a soil, just also the entrainment of the "passenger" chemicals (nutrients and pollutants) dissolved in it.

Figure 13.ane. Moisture fronts for a sandy loam soil.

From Kirkham, Yard.B., Clothier, B.East., ©1994a. Oblong description of water menses into soil from a surface disc. Trans. Int. Congr. Soil Sci. 2b, 38–39. Reprinted by permission of The International Society of Soil Science.

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Principles of Hydrogeology

Nicholas P. Cheremisinoff Ph.D. , in Groundwater Remediation and Treatment Technologies, 1997

Infiltration

The variability of streamflow depends on the source of the supply. If the source of streamflow is from surface runoff, the stream volition be characterized by brusque periods of loftier period and long periods of low flow or no menstruum at all. Streams of this type are known equally "flashy." If the bowl is permeable, there will be little surface runoff and groundwater will provide the stream with a high sustained, uniform menses. These streams are known as "steady". Whether a stream is steady or flashy depends on the infiltration of atmospheric precipitation and snowmelt.

When it rains, some of the water is intercepted by trees or buildings, some is held in depression places on the footing (depression storage), some flows over the ground to a stream (surface runoff), some is evaporated, and some infiltrates. Of the water that infiltrates, a part replenishes the soil-moisture deficiency, if any, while the remainder percolates deeper, perchance condign groundwater. The depletion of soil moisture begins immediately later on a rain due to evaporation and transpiration.

Infiltration chapters (f) is the maximum rate at which a soil is capable of arresting water in a given condition. Several factors control infiltration capacity.

Antecedent rainfall and soil-moisture conditions. Soil wet fluctuates seasonally, usually beingness high during wintertime and bound and low during the summer and fall. If the soil is dry, wetting the top of it volition create a potent capillary potential merely under the surface, supplementing gravity. When wetted, the clays forming the soil swell, which reduces the infiltration capacity before long after a rain starts.

Compaction of the soil due to raindrop bear on.

Inwash of fine material into soil openings, which reduces infiltration capacity. This is especially important if the soil is dry.

Compaction of the soil past animals, roads, trails, urban development, etc.

Certain microstructures in the soil volition promote infiltration, such as soil structure, openings caused by burrowing animals, insects, decomposable rootlets and other vegetative thing, frost heaving, desiccation cracks, and other macropores.

Vegetative cover, which tends to increment infiltration because it promotes populations of burrowing organisms and retards surface runoff, erosion, and compaction by raindrops.

Decreasing temperature, which increases water viscosity, reducing infiltration.

Entrapped air in the unsaturated zone, which tends to reduce infiltration.

Surface gradient.

Infiltration capacity is usually greater at the start of a rain that follows a dry period, but it decreases rapidly (Fig. iii-2). Subsequently several hours it is nearly constant because the soil becomes clogged by particles and swelling clays. A sandy soil, as opposed to a clay-rich soil, may maintain a high infiltration chapters for a considerable time.

Figure three-ii. Infiltration capacity decreases with time during a rainfall consequence.

As the duration of rainfall increases, infiltration capacity continues to decrease. This is partly due to the increasing resistance to flow as the moisture front moves downward; that is, the resistance is a effect of frictional increases due to the increasing length of flow channels and the full general subtract in permeability attributable to swelling clays. If precipitation is greater than infiltration chapters, surface runoff occurs. If precipitation is less than the infiltration capacity, all wet is captivated.

When a soil has been saturated by h2o so allowed to drain by gravity, the soil is said to exist property its field chapters of h2o. (Many investigators are opposed to the utilise and definition of the term field chapters because it does not account for the rapid flow of h2o through preferred paths, such as macropores.) Drainage more often than not requires no more than two or three days and most occurs within one day. A sandy soil has a low field capacity that is reached rapidly; dirt-rich soils are characterized past a loftier field capacity that is reached slowly (Fig. 3-3).

Figure 3-iii. Relation between grain size and field chapters and wilting bespeak.

The water that moves downwards becomes groundwater recharge. Since recharge occurs even when field capacity is not reached, at that place must be a rapid transfer of h2o through the unsaturated zone. This probably occurs through macropores (Pettyjohn, 1982). Figure three-iv is a graph of the water table following a storm that provided slightly more than than three inches of rain in near an hr in mid-July in north-cardinal Oklahoma. At that time the water table in a very fine-grained aquifer was about 7.5 anxiety below land surface. Find that the water tabular array began to rise within a one-half hour of the start of the pelting despite the very low soil-moisture content. The velocity of the infiltrating water through the unsaturated zone was nigh 15 anxiety per hr, and this just could have occurred by flow through fractures and other macropores. Clearly field capacity could non have been reached in this short menstruum of fourth dimension.

Effigy 3-iv. Response of the water table in a fine-grained, unconfined aquifer to a high intensity rain.

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Vadose Water

J.R. Nimmo , in Encyclopedia of Inland Waters, 2009

Infiltration

Infiltration is the downward movement of water through the country surface. If the soil is initially dry, ψ gradients may exist the predominant downward driving strength. When the soil is very wet to some depth, gravity may dominate instead. The usual case is that water infiltrates faster at the start and slows downwardly as a zone of increased water content develops at the surface and expands. Figure 13 shows bodily infiltration rates varying over fourth dimension in three soils. Mathematically, the turn down of infiltration rate as the soil gets wetter is ofttimes represented past an inverse proportionality to the square root of fourth dimension, equally predicted by several models of infiltration. If water at the surface is abundantly available, only not under significant pressure, infiltration occurs at the infiltration capacity, a rate determined by the soil rather than the rate of application or other factors. If water arrives at the state surface faster than the infiltration capacity, backlog water ponds or runs off. Like hydraulic conductivity, infiltration capacity is non single-valued for a given medium but varies with water content and other conditions. Atmospheric condition that complicate the platonic formulation of infiltration include: variation of awarding rate with time, spatial variability of soil and surface backdrop, water repellency of the soil, air trapping, and variations of temperature.

Effigy 13. Measured infiltration rates over fourth dimension for 3 different soils. Reproduced from Swarner LR (1959) Irrigation on western farms. Agriculture Information Bulletin 199, U.Southward. Section of Interior and U.S. Section of Agriculture: Washington, DC.

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Groundwater vulnerability assessment in the Iberian Peninsula nether climate and land cover changes

Mărgărit-Mircea Nistor , ... Shankar Acharya Kamarajugedda , in Climate and Country Use Impacts on Natural and Artificial Systems, 2021

13.3.1.ii Terrain information and potential infiltration map

The infiltration procedure is controlled past the morphology of the terrain and permeability of the lithology in the respective area. Using the 3D surface configuration of the report area and the potential infiltration coefficient (Movie) of the aquifers, the infiltration map was drawn according to Nistor et al. (2015) process. They consider that where the PIC is higher and the slope angle is lower, the infiltration values will be higher. Based on the digital summit model (DEM) the slope angle was generated. The operations were done at the spatial scale in ArcGIS using the normalized values (from 0 to one) of slope bending and Moving-picture show.

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Rainfall and infiltration

Rao South. Govindaraju , Abhishek Goyal , in Rainfall, 2022

14.6 Conclusions

Infiltration plays a fundamental role in the understanding of groundwater and subsurface flows. Due to the natural variability of soil hydraulic properties, the judge of infiltration at unlike spatial scales is still a complex trouble. The understanding of infiltration is further complicated due to the spatio-temporal patterns of rainfall, and the requirements of computationally expensive MC simulations. Even with infiltration theories for inclined surfaces ( Philip, 1991; Chen and Young, 2006), the effects of the slope angle are non representative of results obtained in controlled laboratory experiments. In this affiliate, several local-scale infiltration models were first presented, which were then used to upscale infiltration and soil properties, using simplified approaches. An important issue to be addressed when areal estimates are involved is apropos the determination of Due east[Ks ], CV(Chiliaddue south ), E[r] and CV(r) together with the corresponding quantities for soil wet content which influence the infiltration procedure fifty-fifty though in a limited fashion (Morbidelli et al., 2012). Furthermore, the infiltration rates obtained from dissimilar local-calibration instruments are plagued with measurement and systematic errors, thereby, introducing new uncertainties in the results of the upscaled methods.

1 major challenge for estimating rainfall-infiltration due to the spatial heterogeneity lies in the non-uniqueness of infiltration parameters–for a unmarried rainfall event and in betwixt different rainfall events. For a given rainfall event, at any time t, just a fraction of the probability distribution office of Ks may exist resolved. Future studies that investigate different ways of consolidating infiltration data from independent experiments and exploring simpler means of assessing the nature of incertitude in field-calibration infiltration are required.

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Mountain and Hillslope Geomorphology

A.R. Buda , in Treatise on Geomorphology, 2013

7.7.3.1 Infiltration-Excess Overland Flow

Infiltration-excess overland menstruation is a runoff-generation process that was originally described in a series of papers by Robert Horton (1933, 1945) and essentially occurs equally a result of saturation from above the soil surface past incoming precipitation (Dingman, 2002) (Effigy 1(a)). In the initial stages of the storm, the infiltration rate (f) of a soil is high just declines rapidly as the soil becomes saturated, reaching a constant rate known as the infiltration capacity (Horton, 1939, 1940). When the rainfall charge per unit exceeds the infiltration chapters of a soil, water begins to make full small depressions on the landscape and contributes to depression storage (Dunne and Leopold, 1978). If intense rainfall continues long enough, depression storage is somewhen exceeded, resulting in a canvass of overland menses flowing down the hillslope.

Figure one. Processes that generate surface runoff in response to rainfall: (a) infiltration-excess overland flow, (b) partial area infiltration-excess overland catamenia, (c) saturation-excess overland period, and (d) perched saturation-backlog overland flow. P, precipitation; q o, overland flow; f, infiltration; q r, return flow; q due south, subsurface catamenia.

Adjusted from Beven, K.J., 2001. Rainfall-Runoff Modelling: The Primer. Wiley, Chichester, 360 pp., with permission from Wiley.

From the time information technology was first described, infiltration-excess overland flow was considered to exist the dominant mechanism for surface-runoff generation in watershed hydrology. In fact, the original concept put forth by Horton (1933) assumed a static value of infiltration chapters (Beven, 2006). As a result, rainfall rates in excess of a constant value of infiltration capacity would, in theory, produce infiltration-excess overland menstruation over an unabridged watershed (Figure 1(a)). The idea that infiltration-excess overland menses occurred uniformly across an entire watershed was challenged in a paper by Betson (1964), who used a mathematical model to relate variable infiltration capacities across four modest Appalachian basins to full storm runoff and showed that infiltration-excess overland flow likely occurred merely on iv.half-dozen–85.8% of the watershed area. This finding formed the footing for the partial-area concept of runoff generation (Figure i(b)) and fix the stage for new enquiry highlighting alternate forms of surface-runoff generation.

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Water at the Surface of the Earth

In International Geophysics, 1977

Determining the Rate of Infiltration

Infiltration is sometimes estimated by measuring how long it takes for a given quantity of water ponded or sprinkled on an enclosed soil surface to disappear. This method gives relative values for different soil types, only for diverse reasons, including boundary furnishings, it overestimates the actual rates of infiltration that occur at surfaces over a large area. For the same reason, laboratory measurements of this process in unlike soil columns are difficult to transfer to the field.

Infiltration is more rapid into a sandy soil than a dirt, but beyond this statement, soil texture data practice not serve as good predictors of infiltration capacity (Krimgold and Beenhouwer, 1954). Both capillary potential and capillary electrical conductivity at all levels in the soil profile are of import, but for many soils these parameters are not known, fifty-fifty in relation to other soil properties.

Infiltration that occurred during a storm may be deduced afterward the fact by analyzing runoff during a flow in which the time distribution of rainfall is accurately known. The amount of h2o infiltrated into the soil to any given time is determined by calculation the amount of pelting accumulated to that time and so subtracting runoff accumulated to that fourth dimension and also the depth of the detention–storage layer on the surface. This procedure yields the general time distribution of infiltration, with its typical subtract with fourth dimension. Data on the total book of infiltration during a storm give a general idea of the furnishings of different soil–vegetation systems in a drainage basin on this process. This reversed analysis of h2o dynamics during a storm, however, is not precise because we lack data about water detained at the ground surface. Rates of outflow from this storage into the soil thus cannot be determined accurately.

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The Science of Hydrology

J.West. Hopmans , in Treatise on Water Science, 2011

2.05.four.1 Infiltration

Infiltration measurements can serve diverse purposes. In addition to characterizing infiltration, for example, to compare infiltration betwixt dissimilar soil types, or to quantify macropore menstruation, it is often measured to estimate the relevant soil hydraulic parameters from the plumbing fixtures of the infiltration data to a specific physically based infiltration model. This is mostly known every bit inverse modeling. Infiltration is generally measured using ane of three different methods: a sprinkler method, a ring infiltration method, or a permeameter method. The sprinkler method is mostly applied to determine time of ponding for different water application rates, whereas the ring infiltrometer method is used when the infiltration chapters is needed. The permeameter method provides a way to mensurate infiltration across a small range of h-values ⩽0. A general review of all three methods was recently presented past Smettem and Smith (Smith et al., 2002), whereas a comparing of different infiltration devices using vii criteria was presented by Clothier (2001).

Rainfall sprinklers or rainfall simulators are too sprinkler infiltrometers, just they are typically used to written report runoff and soil erosion (e.m., Morin et al., 1967). They mimic the rainfall characteristics (east.g., kinetic energy) of natural storms, specifically the rainfall rate, rainfall droplet size distribution, and drop velocity. Most of these devices measure infiltration by subtracting runoff from applied water. Using a range of water application rates, infiltration measurements can be used to make up one's mind the i(I) curve for a specific soil blazon, with specific soil hydraulic properties such as K s or S. Various design parameters for many developed rainfall simulators, specifically nozzle systems, were presented past Peterson and Bubenzer (1986). A portable and inexpensive simulator for infiltration measurements along hillslopes was developed past Battany and Grismer (2000). This low-pressure organization used a hypodermic syringe needle system to class uniform aerosol at rainfall intensities ranging from twenty to 90   mm   h−1.

Band infiltrometers have historically been used to characterize soil infiltration by determining the infiltration chapters, i c. A ring is advisedly inserted in the soil and then that h2o can be ponded over a known area. Since a constant head is required, a constant water level is maintained either by manually adding water and using a measuring stick to maintain a abiding depth of ponded water, by using a Mariotte system, or by a valve connected to a float that closes at a predetermined water level. Measurements are unremarkably continued until the infiltration rate is substantially constant. Water seepage effectually the infiltrometer is prevented by compaction of the soil effectually and outside of the infiltrometer. Multidimensional water flow under the ring is minimized by pushing the ring deeper into the soil, or past including an outer buffer ring. In the latter case, the soil between the two concentric rings is ponded at the same depth as the inner ring, to minimize lateral flow directed radially outward. The deviation from the assumed one-dimensionality depends on ring insertion depth, ring bore, measurement time and soil properties such as its hydraulic electrical conductivity, and the presence of restricting soil layers. A sensitivity assay on diverging flow of infiltrometers was presented by Bouwer (1986) and Wu et al. (1997).

Permeameters are more often than not smaller than infiltrometers and allow easy control of the soil water pressure level caput at the soil surface. Generally, multidimensionality of flow must be taken into account, using Wooding's (1968) equation for steady flow (Q , 503 T−1) from a shallow, circular surface pond of free h2o, or

(24a) Q = K south ( π r 0 2 + 4 r 0 α )

The get-go and 2d terms in parentheses denote the gravitational and capillary components of infiltration and α denotes the parameter in Gardner's (1958) unsaturated hydraulic electrical conductivity function:

(24b) Grand ( h ) = K s exp ( α h )

In this model of the and so-called Gardner soil, the macroscopic capillary length, λ c, is equivalent to ane/α. The bones analysis for nearly permeameter methods relies on Wooding's solution. An extensive review of the use of permeameters was presented past Clothier (2001), including the tension infiltrometers and disk permeameters, by which the soil water force per unit area at water entry is controlled by a chimera tower. Their apply is relatively simple, and based on analytical solutions of steady-state water flow. The permeameter method is economical in water utilize and portable. The soil hydraulic properties (Southward and K), in an inverse style, can be inferred from measurements using (1) both short- and long-fourth dimension observations, (two) disks with various radii, or (iii) using multiple h2o pressure heads. Transient solutions of infiltration may be preferable, as it allows analysis of shorter infiltration times, so that the method is faster and likely volition improve satisfy the homogeneous soil assumption. Differences betwixt i- and iii-dimensional solutions for transient infiltration were analyzed by Haverkamp et al. (1994), Vandervaere et al. (2000), and Smith et al. (2002) from multidimensional numerical modeling analysis. These effects were reported to be small if gravity effects were included. Nowadays, permeameters are most often applied to approximate the soil's hydraulic characteristics in an inverse way, by fitting infiltration data to analytical solutions. In many cases, auxiliary water content or matric potential data are required to yield unique solutions.

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Precipitation, WATERSHED ANALYSIS

J.V. Bonta , in Encyclopedia of Soils in the Environment, 2005

Watershed Processes

Infiltration at the land surface significantly affects the timing and amounts of high and depression watershed flows. Infiltration during rainfall events is afflicted by soil type, porosity, texture, vegetative comprehend, land management, preferential menstruation in soil and bedrock due to roots, cracks, and soil fauna. Macropores in natural systems can contribute significant amounts of infiltrated water and pollutants quickly to shallow and deep waters under high-intensity rainfalls. Advanced infiltration models require short-fourth dimension increment atmospheric precipitation to simulate matrix and macropore flow.

Country management tin can significantly affect infiltration. For example, rainfall on a field plowed with a moldboard plow tends to cause development of a relatively impervious surface due to crusting, whereas surface rest protects the soil surface from crusting with no-till cropping.

Infiltration is likewise afflicted past the degree of saturation since the final rainfall issue (TBS, described above) as influenced by evapotranspiration (ET) and drainage rates. ET and drainage between storm events vary with soil blazon, vegetative cover, position on the landscape, attribute, geology, land apply, climate, and fourth dimension and weather since the terminal rainfall (TBS). The rate of water loss in the soil affects the storage available for water at the offset of the next rainfall event ('antecedent soil water conditions').

In some watersheds, h2o moves horizontally most the surface as 'interflow.' The interflow process stores storm water for tedious release either during a storm or after a tempest has ended. It can as well contribute to wetter antecedent atmospheric condition. Its effect on runoff, water quality, and erosion depends on the fourth dimension until rainfall starts once again (TBS) and drainage and ET rates. In add-on, interflow can re-emerge at the land surface, causing localized seeps (this is known as 'exfiltration') that immediately generates runoff during a storm.

Interflow, groundwater flow, and spatial variability of soil characteristics affect ancestor h2o atmospheric condition nonuniformly on a watershed surface. Typically, higher soil-water levels can be institute in concave parts of the hillslope and forth the periphery of stream channels. This is because soil water accumulates by gravity in these low areas during and betwixt storm events. This leads to areas of watersheds that are wetter than others and that tin can run off sooner in a storm compared with drier areas. Even so, runoff can be randomly generated from whatsoever role of the mural due to local factors. The nonuniformity of ancestor conditions leads to areas of the watershed that expand as areas become wetter during a storm, leading to a 'variable source surface area' of runoff generation. Runoff from these varying areas is sensitive to changing rainfall intensities during storms, affecting timing and amounts of runoff, chemicals, and sediment transported.

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