The dissertation project "Mass transport of underground stored non-nuclear waste materials in adjacent aquifers" refers to the current topics of expiring coal mining in Germany, associated mine flooding and the problem of stowed metal-containing residues. For this purpose, laboratory tests such as column tests, single fracture experiments and flow cell experiments with typical country rock samples and waters of differing chemical composition were carried out. To enable reviews and predictions of mass transport into adjacent aquifers - based on the experimental results - a modeling of contaminant transport for a single fracture was performed.

Zwei Sedimentbecken im Mexikanischen Altiplano wurden hinsichtlich ihres hydrogeologischen Aufbaus und ihrer Fließprozesse untersucht: das Becken von San Luis Potosí (Bundesstaat San Luis Potosí) und das Calera-Benito Juárez Becken (Bundesstaat Zacatecas). Dazu wurde für beide Grundwassersysteme ein hydrogeologisches Modell erstellt, das als Basis einer numerischen Strömungsmodellierung diente.

In this project, water flow and permeability distribution in a tectonically complex karst aquifer on a regional scale are studied and simulated by means of high-performance computing. The study area Hastenrather Graben, located about 15 km northeast of the city of Aachen, has a complex tectonic history.

Groundwater is the only water resource on the Mexican Yucatán Peninsula. But it is endangered by different hazards: a rising need of water in tourist regions, the lack of possibilities to drain off waste water via rivers but instead injecting them into deeper, saltier parts of the groundwater zone and a high vulnerability of the aquifer because it is not covered by impermeable layers. In cooperation with the Mexican universities of Yucatán and San Luis Potosí, the groundwater of Merida, the capital of the federal state of Yucatán, is probed and a groundwater surveillance system has been installed.

Vom Lehr- und Forschungsgebiet Hydrogeologie wurde in enger Zusammenarbeit mit dem Lehrstuhl und Institut für Wasserbau und Wasserwirtschaft (IWW, RWTH Aachen) und der RWE Power AG ein experimentelles Labormodell entworfen, das zur beschleunigten Nachbildung der in einem realen Brunnen ablaufenden Verockerungsprozesse eingesetzt wird.

Urban areas in Indonesia are characterized by rapid urban population growth and located in the coastal cities. The demand for clean water primarily from groundwater for domestic and commercial purposes increases continually in line with population growth. This study is focused on major improvements to the existing hydrogeological model and applied it to simulate groundwater flow under steady state and transient conditions by integrating geological, hydrogeological and hydrological data.

The aim of this work was the investigation of the hydraulic conditions and in particular the interaction of the aquifers in the area of the city of Viersen in cooperation with NiederrheinWasser GmbH.The complex hydrogeological conditions prevailing as a result of the mismatching of disturbances and heterogeneous lithology with hydraulic window structures were described and analyzed in a hydrogeological model.Based on a transient numerical groundwater model, the hydrogeological models were implemented and tested.A transport model was used to simulate the present conditions in order to understand the evolution of nitrate concentrations and to investigate the process of nitrate transport on a field scale.

Aquifers contaminated with naturally occurring arsenic (As) threaten millions of people worldwide. In major problem areas (e.g. Bangladesh, Vietnam, Latin America), As in groundwater originates from the weathering of As-bearing minerals of which Fe-oxides and -hydroxides play the most important role in many sedimentary systems. Studies of natural As in Germany carried out until today are restricted to local or regional scales. This project aims at a spatial and stratigraphical comparison of German aquifers dominated by oxidic Fe-minerals and affected by elevated As-concentrations.