Modeling and Analysis of salt precipitation on Evaporation processes in the unsaturated zone

Par:EMNA MEJRI

Evaporation of water from porous media is a common process which is becoming more and more important to understand key natural and engineered processes relevant to water management, global water cycle, soil and groundwater salinization and many other environmental and industrial applications. In many fields in arid and semi-arid regions, evaporation from porous media may induce salt deposition and crystallization on the top of the surface or within the porous matrix. Although the study of such phenomenon is complex, it is of great importance because of the damages it can induce to the porous media structure, and also due to its effects on the evaporation process affecting soil productivity in many arid and semi-arid regions. The main focus of this project is on the interpretation and modeling of evaporation salinization processes driven by the exchange between the free-flow and porous-media-flow interface. This exchange is due to various processes that happen on the interface between porous media and the atmosphere. The goal of this project is to develop a model which can reproduce the complex interaction at the free-flow and porous-media interface in detail and which allows the simulation and analysis of sequences of evaporation and salt precipitation related to hydro-climatic conditions in Tunisia. Furthermore, different scenarios will be analyzed with respect to the required model complexity aiming at a model reduction and an improved modeling on the field scale.