ON THE FLOWING HORIZONTAL-WELLS

A flowing horizontal well is a special type of horizontal well that does not have pumping/injecting facility. The discharge rate of a flowing horizontal well is controlled by the hydraulic gradient between the aquifer and the well and it generally varies with time if the hydraulic head of the aquifer is transient. This type of well has been used in landslide control, mining dewatering, water table control, underground water transportation through a horizontal tunnel, agricultural water drainage, and other applications. Flowing horizontal wells have quite different hydrodynamic characteristics from horizontal wells with fixed pumping or injecting rates because their discharge rates are functions of the aquifer hydraulic heads (Zhan et al, 2001; Zhan and Zlotnik, 2002). Although the hydraulics of flowing vertical wells have been extensively investigated before, Hydraulics of flowing horizontal wells have rarely been studied. The purpose of this paper is to obtain analytical solutions of groundwater flow to a flowing horizontal-well in a confined aquifer, in a water table aquifer without precipitation, and in a water table aquifer with precipitation. The functions of the flowing horizontal well discharge rates versus time will be obtained under above mentioned different aquifer conditions. The relationships of the aquifer hydraulic heads versus the discharge rates of the well will be investigated. The rate of water table decline due to the dewatering of the well will also be computed, and this solution is particularly useful for landslide control and mining dewatering. The theoretical solutions will be compared with results of numerical solutions and experiments that will be conducted in the hydrological laboratory at Texas A&M University.