Abstract
Gravity-driven groundwater flow systems function in topographic basins as subsurface conveyor belts. They pick up and move fluids, gases, solutes, colloids, particulate matter and heat from loading sites in recharge areas and/or on their way to the discharge areas and can deliver them “en route” or in discharge regions. Gravitational flow systems of various horizontal and vertical extents are organized into hierarchically nested complex patterns controlled by the configuration of the water table’s relief and modified by the rock framework’s heterogeneities of permeability. The systems are ubiquitous and act simultaneously on broad ranges of the spatial and temporal scales of measurement. Their universal geologic agency is manifest by numerous different, even disparate, natural processes and phenomena. Several of these are associated with geothermal heat flow. The understanding of geothermal phenomena in the context of basinal flow systems requires, therefore, an intimate familiarity with the overarching “...
Highlights
The objective of the present essay was to explain and to support the thesis that regional heat-flow studies are incomplete without an analysis of the basin-scale flow distribution of groundwater
The patterns of gravity-driven basin-scale groundwater flow were shown to be controlled by the relief of the water table and modified by permeability heterogeneities of the basin’s rock framework
Complex flow fields develop beneath undulating water tables which generate hierarchically-nested flow systems of different order
Summary
Tóth Basic concepts of the hydraulics of gravity-driven basin-scale flow of groundwater Effect of the relief of the water-table. The basic effects of the water table’s configuration on groundwater flow patterns in basins of homogeneous rock framework can be studied by substituting a sinusoidal surface for the linear upper boundary of the Unit Basin (Tóth 1963). Another important feature of the complex flow pattern is the possible existence of “quasi-stagnant” zones (or, mathematically, “singular points”) at locations where flow systems of any order may converge from, or part toward, opposite directions (Jiang et al 2011) In these areas, the low or zero lateral hydraulic gradients, combined with the corollary poor transport ability of the waters and converging flow directions, have significant ramifications for the accumulation of matter and/or geothermal heat, as exemplified by many anomalously warm fields of petroleum.
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