Delineation of recharge rate from a hybrid water table fluctuation method

The concept of the hybrid water table fluctuation (WTF) method for recharge rate estimation was revisited. To estimate the recharge rate, a physically based WTF equation was established. The concept of transient fillable porosity was proposed and computed with unsaturated hydraulics models. The developed model is tested by applying to the water table fluctuation data from Hongcheon, Korea. In the applications, the recharge and fillable porosity estimates were found to be most sensitive to nonlinearity in the unsaturated water content profile and permeability. Also, the water table level drift, which does not originate from precipitation, serves as a major source of estimation error.