Spatial delineation of groundwater salinity using deep TDEM geophysical measurements: a feasibility study
Eldad Levi, Mark Goldman, Avichay Hadad and Haim Gvirtzman
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The study was conducted at 21 locations at the Judea desert plateau (Fig. 1), where fresh groundwater flows through the upper aquifers from the replenishment area at the Judea Mountains toward the Dead Sea springs. In deeper aquifers brackish and saline groundwater bodies exist, originated from lakes and lagoons, existed at the Dead Sea Rift valley during the Pleistocene and Pliocene, respectively. It was found that within carbonate formations, fresh groundwater (C<103 ppm Total Dissolved Solids, TDS) is characterized by a resistivity of more than 15 ohm-m; brackish groundwater (103
Hydrogeophysics is an evolving research discipline. This feasibility study, as a single step within this evolution, had two objectives: (1) to test the potential application of the improved, deeper-exploration-capability (to depths ~1.5-2 km), time domain electromagnetic (TDEM) geophysical method, named Cycle-5M, for hydrological research; (2) to delineate the spatial distribution of fresh, brackish and saline groundwater bodies, as well as brine, beneath the Judea Desert, Israel. The study results show that both intentions were successful.
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