Land Surface Model outputs (evaporation, transpiration, groundwater recharge) are influenced by uncertain parameters. Global sensitivity metrics provide a ranking of the importance of uncertain factors. Evaporation is directly influenced by the net radiation and by the parameters associated with the top litter layer. Transpiration appears as mainly influenced by the vegetation characteristics and by albedo. Groundwater recharge is influenced mainly by soil-related parameters.

Vertical maps of seismic velocity reflect variations of subsurface porosity. We use such images to design the geometry of subsurface compartments delimited by velocity thresholds. The obtained patterns are inserted into a hydrogeological model to test the influence of random geometries, velocity thresholds, and hydraulic parameters on data estimated from the model: the depth of the groundwater and magnetic resonance sounding is a geophysical method sensitive to subsurface water content.

The reproduction of flows and contaminations underground requires a good estimation of the parameters of the geological environment (mainly permeability and porosity), in three dimensions. While most researchers rely on geophysical methods, which are costly and difficult to implement in the field, this study proposes an alternative using data that are already widely available: piezometric records (monitoring of the water table) and the lithological description of the piezometric wells.

The AquiFR hydrogeological modelling platform aims to provide short-term-to-seasonal hydrological forecasts over France for daily water management and long-term simulations for climate impact studies. The results described in this study confirm the feasibility of gathering independent groundwater models into the same numerical tool. This new tool encourages the development of groundwater modelling, and it has the potential to be valuable for many operational and research applications.

In many fields like climate change, hydrology and agronomy, water movement in unsaturated soils is usually simulated using the Richards equation. However, this equation requires lot of computational effort to be solved due to its highly nonlinear behavior, which hampers its use in simulations. In this paper, we analyze and developed some numerical strategies and we evaluate their reliability and efficiency.