Adaptation of the Carter‐Tracy Water Influx Calculation to Groundwater Flow Simulation

The Carter‐Tracy calculation for water influx is adapted to groundwater flow simulation with additional clarifying explanation not present in the original papers. The Van Everdingen and Hurst aquifer‐influence functions for radial flow from an outer aquifer region are employed. This technique, based on convolution of unit‐step response functions, offers a simple but approximate method for embedding an inner region of groundwater flow simulation within a much larger aquifer region where flow can be treated in an approximate fashion. The use of aquifer‐influence functions in groundwater flow modeling reduces the size of the computational grid with a corresponding reduction in computer storage and execution time. The Carter‐Tracy approximation to the convolution integral enables the aquifer influence function calculation to be made with an additional storage requirement of only two times the number of boundary nodes more than that required for the inner region simulation. It is a good approximation for constant flow rates but is poor for time‐varying flow rates where the variation is large relative to the mean. A variety of outer aquifer region geometries, exterior boundary conditions, and flow rate versus potentiometric head relations can be used. The radial, transient‐flow case presented is representative. An analytical approximation to the functions of Van Everdingen and Hurst for the dimensionless potentiometric head versus dimensionless time is given.