Effective porosity values used in calibrated transport simulations in a fissured and slightly karstified chalk aquifer

In fissured and slighly karstified chalks, the main difficulty for modelling groundwater flow and transport consists in finding a good approximation of the highly heterogeneous reality by a REV concept. No major problem is encountered for groundwater flow simulations when the high contrast in hydraulic conductivity can be given to the cells/elements of the model. The Darcy’s law is applied in terms of specific flow rate, through the REV. When considering transport, it is often assumed that the calibrated field of hydraulic conductivity should be kept unchanged. Consequently, ‘physically non acceptable’ values of the effective porosity are often needed to obtain a match between modelled and measured breakthrough curves. The model becomes, to some extent, a black-box model.