CAZALAC - Centro del Agua para Zonas Aridas de ALC

International Course on Water Deposit Pollution (La Serena - Chile, November 23 to 26, 2004)

Pollution represents an important alteration of the natural characteristics of groundwater due to the addition of substances – pollution – and due to flow alteration resulting from human activities like intensive agriculture and irrigation, urbanization, residue storage – dumps, poorly designed drilling and wells, negligent mining and industrial activities, uncontrolled pouring, etc. Several aspects add up to the above problems, like the fact that protecting and/or restoring processes are difficult to materialize, that contamination is recognized on a delayed basis, that determining pollution causes – and, thus, who is responsible for cleaning – is complicated; that remedy techniques – like monitoring – are expensive, and that legal responsibilities generally represent a complicated way out.

Contamination of groundwater resources is one of the most severe problems that industrialized countries and emerging economies are currently facing, so important efforts are being made to regularize this condition and mitigate the problems, in order to ensure a sustainable use of underground resources. In non industrialized countries - like the majority of the Latin American nations - this problem is even more critical. If no realistic and proportioned measures are taken on a timely basis, then this could hamper their development efforts, increase the distance between income and welfare, make greater mistakes than the countries who preceded them, with no time and means to mitigate them.

This course was proposed as a response to Contamination of Groundwater Resources in Latin America, and represented an opportunity for several specialists and researchers may present and discuss their experiences with experts coming from Israel, who have an ample experience in water contamination and management.

Course Objectives

To provide a space so that researchers and managers of water resources, with basic knowledge on the proposed issue, can discuss experiences on water pollution in rural and urban areas y their management, so that this problem can be mitigated, with the final purpose of ensuring a sustainable use of underground water resources.

Contents

The course, addressed to professionals performing in topics linked to Underground Hydrology, Environmental Hydro-geology and similar disciplines, and Water Resources Managers and Administrators with basic knowledge on this topic and that are dedicated to research and/or management on this issue, had the following main contents.

Chemical composition variability in underground water resources.
Chemical processes and transportation processes in the interface between the saturated zone and non-saturated zone.
Underground water contamination with nitrates in Israel. Case study.
Multi-component modeling of multi-phase problems – volatile organic compound spills (VOCs)
Modeling variable density flow phenomena.
The use of "shock waves" for aquifer remediation
Optimum modeling of water management
Role of the non-saturated zone in underground water management
Notion of the scale phenomenon
New multi-level monitoring system for underground water resources.
The capillary zone. Production of CO2 in the capillary zone of deep underground water deposits.

Teachers

Dr. Daniel Ronen, Researcher of the Research Department of the Israel Hydrological Service y Teacher and researcher of the Department of Environmental Hydrology and Microbiology, Ben Gurion University of the Negev.
Dr. Shaul Sorek, Teacher and researcher of the Department of Environmental Hydrology and Microbiology, Ben Gurion University of the Negev.

Presentations of case studies by invited national experts and course participants:

Igor Aguirre – National Mining and Geology Service
Jaime Muñoz – General Water Directorate Santiago
Luis Rojas – General Water Directorate Santiago
Laura Vitoria – University of Barcelona
Jorge Oyarzun – University of La Serena
Héctor Maureira – University of La Serena

Organization

Guido Soto, Executive Director, CAZALAC
Elier Tabilo-Valdivieso, CAZALAC
Edmundo González, Teacher, University of La Serena
Jorge Oyarzun, Teacher, University of La Serena.

Institutional Support

Embassy of Israel in Chile
Mashav, Department of International Cooperation of the State Department of the State of Israel Government of Flanders, Belgium
UNESCO/IHP-International Hydrological Program of UNESCO
University of La Serena
Water Center for Arid and Semi-Arid Zones in Latin America and The Caribbean - CAZALAC
IHP National Committee, Chile
National Geology and Mining Service – SERNAGEOMIN
General Water Directorate – DGA.

Attendants

A total of 49 students from domestic and international institutions attended the course.

Contents

Case study. Underground water contamination with nitrates in Israel (The problem, causes, monitoring problems, analytical problems, management problems)
Chemical composition variability of underground resources (The problem of underground water chemical heterogeneity and associated monitoring and analysis problems)
Optimal national water management: A discussion on the need for the development of a quantitative management tool for the optimal allocation of water (quantity and quality) between different competing stakeholders.
Environmental regulations on water resources in Chile.
New multi-level passive sampling system (Description of a multi-level passive underground water monitoring system, application in flow profile studies and vertical chemical profiles and preventive monitoring of underground water resources)
Contamination of water deposits with VOCs (the unique problem of groundwater deposit s with volatile organic compounds)
Methodologies used in the National Geology and Mining Service to detect groundwater contamination
The Agriculture and Livestock Service’s role in controlling polluting sources in irrigation water resources
Modeling multi-component multiphase problems – e.g., Spills of VOCs: Coupled flow and transport of phases and components under urban infrastructure
Mining and ground water deposit contamination: Determining factors
Use of isotopes in underground water to trace nitrate contaminants
The capillary zone (Analysis of the water structure, importance and flow in the capillary zone of subsurface water deposits)
Chemical processes and transportation processes in the interface between the saturated zone and the non saturated zone (Studies of processes in the interface between saturated and non saturated zone)
Underground water resources in Chile. Policies and current status
Modeling the phenomena of variable density flow patterns (Comparison between a continuum 2 dimensional model and a lumped parameter model for the case of salt water intrusion into a freshwater aquifer)
On the production of CO2 in the capillary zone of deep aquifers
Water geo-chemistry and its application to hydro-geology
The use of shock waves for solute displacement in porous media (Following a theoretical development, four different experimental setups provide evidence for significant solute displacement after emitting shock waves through saturated porous matrix)
The notion of scale phenomena (the role of a small spatial scale adjacent to a larger one and developments after excitation along different time periods)
The role of the non saturated zone in underground water management (Storage properties of water and contaminants, chemical and biological process reactor delaying contamination processes)