Water Research Centre
First point of contact for Water Researchers in Oman
Director’s Message
The Water Research Center celebrates the World Water Day 2013
in conjunction with the Department
of Soils, Water and Agricultural Engineering (College of Agriculture
and Marine Sciences), SQU and the
Ministry of Regional Municipalities
Dr. Osman Abdalla
and Water Resources. The celebration program will include a scientific workshop entitled
"Workshop on Water Cooperation Towards Resources Sustainability" that will be held on the 23rd of March 2013 at Al
Fahm Hall, Cultural Center (SQU). In December 2010, the
United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) declared 2013 as
the UN International Year of Water Cooperation. The Water
Cooperation is a broader theme covering multiple aspects
including cultural, educational, scientific, religious, ethical,
social, political, legal, institutional and economic. The workshop covers most of the topics related to the water cooperation by bringing international, national and regional experiences together. The workshop aims at disseminating the
knowledge and share the experience on different aspects of
water cooperation.
March 2013
The Effect of the Al-Khod Dam on the
Subsurface Soil Properties,
Infiltration and
Recharge Efficiency
by: Dr. Ali Al Maktoumi
The Sultanate of Oman is an arid
country where drought conditions
prevail and water is precious. Oman
experiences a severe water shortage problem that threatens the national plans for developments in different sectors. Oman government agencies and other research institutions have been actively addressing different ways of
augmenting water resources (which are mainly groundwater). One of effective measures is enhancing groundwater
recharge (artificial recharge), by means of intercepting
floodwater after rainfall events and infiltrating this water
into the soil and aquifers, in excess of natural recharge.
Recharge dams play an important role in augmentation of
water resources in arid countries. While desalination provides an unlimited but costly water supply, recharge dams
provide a limited water supply but relatively cheaply. Additional benefits of recharge dams are flood protection and
deceleration or even reversing of seawater intrusion in
coastal areas by creating groundwater mounds and, correspondingly, excess seaward oriented hydraulic slopes in the
aquifers. Therefore, maintaining dam efficiency is necessary to achieve the optimum use of catchment-scale water
resources.
In addition to the workshop, the Sultan Qaboos University
students will organize an open day in to raise the public
awareness with regard to water resources and the role of
society in preserving such resources. The events will take
place between 4:00 pm and 9:00 pm in March 21, 2013 at Al
Sahwa Park time and in March 23, 2013 at City Center Car- As many studies around the globe reported, recharge dams
refour (Mawaleh).
are experiencing the problem of siltation (deposition of
detached and transported soil particles that are brought as
a sediment load by runoff water). This adversely affects the
storage capacity of the dam along with other problems.
Over time, layers of silt and/or other sedimented finer and
coarser particles cover the bottom of the dam reservoir. As
obvious, the infiltration rate decreases, water loss via evaporation increases, and the storage capacity of the dam is
reduced. As a common practice, this silt layer is removed in
an attempt to improve the infiltration and the storage of
the dam. The anti-silt mechanical (buldozzing, drilling) intervention greatly improves the ability of the reservoir area
Oman Water Society (OWS) holds a series of workto act as a surface-to-subsurface hydrological sink. These
shops and seminars on different aspects of water
techniques are, however, costly, tedious and require recurscience. The workshop on fog collection was orgaring actions after each flood-deposition event. We hypothnized in 23-25 September, 2012 in Salalah at the
esize, however, that a part of the fine particles from the
Crown Plaza Hotel where a group of scientists from
deposited load of flood water is carried vertically into the
porous medium especially through the large pores. Consethe Sultan Qaboos University has participated in the
quently, the surface scraping cannot remove the clogging
workshop and presented a couple of presentations.
particulates, which have already migrated deep into the
parent bed material.
Water Research Centre
First point of contact for Water Researchers in Oman
These fine particles may also gradually change the physiochemical properties of the original subsurface porous medium.
The primary objective of our research, funded by SQU, is to
investigate the effect of the Al-Khoud dam on the reservoir
soil properties and the recharge to underlying aquifers.
Understanding the behavior and patterns of the percolating soil particles and their effect on infiltration and recharge are of critical importance for better management
strategies. This understanding will provide the foundation
for future decision making by the Ministry of Regional Municipalities and Water Resources and other governmental
agencies as related future dam design and maintenance.
Both field and laboratory experiments along with analytical
and numerical modeling is used in the study. The model
will help to gain more insight into the kinetics of filtration
and evolution of infiltration fronts in essentially heterogeneous porous media. In our experiments, 37 pedons have
been already excavated (inside the dam reservoirs and
within the vicinity of the dam area) and the soil has been
studied in details at different depths and areal loci. The
change in the hydrological properties has been investigated
using infiltration and piezometer experiments in the field
and column and pot experiments in the laboratory and the
SQU Agricultural Experiment Station.
Primary analysis of the results revealed that the soil genesis is cumbersome and soils are evolving with a very short
time. This results in complicated and dynamic heterogeneities due to various factors. The resulting heterogeneities of
soil texture along with the incoming runoff water present
clearly the interaction between the pedology and the hydrology, which in the international literature has been recently identified as a new branch of science,
“hydropedology”. Along with scaling problem, the alterations of the soil properties are found to significantly affect
the time to ponding, and the infiltration recharge patterns
within the dam area. This increases the potential hazards
of flooding in the areas adjacent and downstream of the
dam through over-spilling of ponded water. Recharge area
downstream the dam receives pluses of ponded water that
is rich of suspended materials which in part may translocate vertically into the subsurface system, and hence adversely affects the recharge process. Better understanding
of the soil-water dynamics is targeted, with the behavior of
the downward translocated fine particles. Using a column
experiment and a mathematical model, the team currently
studies the dynamics of the migrating particles into porous
medium using both glass beads and artificial sands. These
fine particles may also gradually change the physiochemical
properties of the original subsurface porous medium.
March 2013
The experimentations and theoretical studies are continuing to better understand the physiochemical processes causing the alterations of the soil properties
and hence the hydrological processes on the subsurface area .
Nature Inspiration for better
water resources management
and conservation
by: Dr. Ali Al Maktoumi
The hydropedological study of the reservoir bed of AlKhoud dam, revealed a fascinating sedimentation
pattern which evolved into an intricate composition of
different soil textures. The discovered soil morphology reflects the complex topology of water motion
(infiltration-seepage-evaporation) through the naturally engineered soil structure both during rare flood
events with ensuing periods of ponding, and long and
common dry-dam periods. These naturally morphed
soils demonstrated the ability to preserve a large
quantity of water at a depth from 0.5 to 2 m, despite
the high temperature and dryness of the top soil. The
hydrological optimality and “smartness” of these soils
is attributed to the existence of a unique matrix-crack
harmonious system. Measurements of soil moisture
content confirmed hydrological immobility of water
within block-components of the smart design provided these blocks are not depleted by transpiration. The
novel and smart phenomena discovered by the research team unveils the possible alteration of soil heterogeneity for optimization of the soil-water cosmos
in arid zone soils.
Water Research Center would like to organize
scientific seminars and encourage all water colleagues to participate and share their experience and knowledge. The last seminar was given
by Prof. Ian Clark the professor of isotope hydrology from Ottawa University who visited the
university in a research collaboration project to
conduct field work study on Nobel Gases sample
collections from wells and springs. Seminar coordination can be arranged via contact with the
center
coordinator
Mrs.
Kate
at
kate@squ.edu.om.
For suggestions or comments please email us at wrc@squ.edu.om or call 2414-3151 & look for Ms. Kate