| Riverbank Filtration (RBF) Systems, because of their advantages of natural and effective filtration processes, have shown promise for the water supply industry. However, the hydraulic aspects of RBF system, which also play an important role in RBF system design, have not aroused sufficient attention. More specific research work needs to be done.; This research focused on the numerical modeling of hydraulics in a RBF system, especially how effectively to model the radial collector wells commonly used in RBF systems. Based on the RBF site near the B. E. Payne Plant of the Louisville Water Company (LWC), numerous finite element modeling analyses have been done; various factors affecting the RBF system performance have been determined and evaluated.; To model the radial collector well effectively, some possible well modeling methods have been examined for the LWC RBF site; moreover, two novel well models, infinite-conductivity-well model and finite-conductivity-well model, have been proposed for the radial collector wells to provide analyses with/without consideration of pressure drop in collectors, respectively. Calibration results show that the new method proposed can provide answers much more consistent with field monitoring data.; To study the effects of seasonal temperature fluctuations on the LWC RBF performance, a long term (four years) transient flow-heat coupled analysis was done for the B. E. Payne Plant RBF site using the proposed new radial collector well model. The computation results matched the temperature and water elevation records very well.; Based on those analyses, some useful conclusions were reached and some recommendations were proposed for further study in this field. |
