Stochastic analysis of groundwater flow in a two‐dimensional generalized fractal field

Abstract

Stochastic analysis of groundwater flow in a generalized fractal field is performed in this study. The random field is described by fractional Levy motion (fLm), which is a generalized version of traditional fractional Brownian motion (fBm) and is superior to describe a field with a high degree of variability. A truncated power variogram of the fLm is derived using the weighted superposition of mutually uncorrelated exponential variograms. When the Levy index of fLm α equals 2, the fBm is recovered. When the upper and lower cutoffs of the truncated power variogram are close, the stationary exponential model can be well approximated. First‐order perturbation analyses of flow in a two‐dimensional fLm field are performed and results are compared to those in the stationary exponential and fractal fBm fields. Since the proposed general fractal model has broader applications than the stationary and fBm models, it is versatile enough to simulate flow in different scenarios and provide more accurate modeling results.