SEEP/W is a finite element software product for analysing groundwater seepage and excess porewater pressure dissipation problems. The comprehensive formulation of SEEP/W makes it possible to consider analyses ranging from simple saturated steady problems to sophisticated saturated/unsaturated time dependent problems.
Features and benefits of SEEP/W
SEEP/W can model almost any groundwater problem, including:
- Dissipation of excess pore pressure after reservoir drawdown
- Changes in pore-water pressure conditions within earth slopes due to infiltration of precipitation
- Mounding of the groundwater table beneath water retention structures such as lagoons and tailings ponds \
- Effect of subsurface drains and injection wells
- Drawdown of a water table due to pumping from an aquifer
- Seepage flow quantities into excavations
- Use AIR/W and consider the true matric suction (Ua-Uw) mechanisms
- Integrate with TEMP/W and consider flow in freezing and thawing soils
plus many more!
Defining a Seepage/Air flow Model
The unique CAD-like technology in SEEP/W allows you to generate your finite element mesh by drawing regions on the screen. You can then interactively apply boundary conditions and specify material properties. You can even estimate the material property functions from easily measured parameters like grain-size, saturated conductivity, saturated water content, and the air-entry value. If you make a mistake, you can correct it using the Undo command.
Viewing the Analysis Results
Once you have solved your seepage problem, SEEP/W offers many tools for viewing results. Generate contours or x-y plots of any computed parameter, such as head, pressure, gradient, velocity, and conductivity. Velocity vectors show flow direction and rate. Transient conditions can be shown as the changing water table position over time. Interactively query computed values by clicking on any node, Gauss region, or flux section. Then export results into other applications, such as Microsoft Excel or Word, for further analysis or to prepare presentations.
Saturated/Unsaturated Flow
SEEP/W can model both saturated and unsaturated flow, a feature that greatly broadens the range of problems that can be analysed. In addition to traditional steady state saturated flow analysis, the saturated/unsaturated formulation of SEEP/W makes it possible to analyse seepage as a function of time and to consider such processes as the infiltration of precipitation.
The transient feature allows you to analyse such problems as the migration of a wetting front and the dissipation of excess pore water pressure.
Analysis Types
- Steady state and transient flow conditions
- Confined and unconfined flow
- Transient head and/or flux as a function of time
- Flux as a function of computed head
- Review and automatic modification of seepage face conditions
- Two dimensional flow in a vertical plane
- Three dimensional axisymmetric flow
- Two dimensional flow in plan view
Boundary Conditions
- Constant hydraulic head and/or flux conditions
Soil Properties
The hydraulic conductivity of the soil is a function of the negative pore water pressure in unsaturated regions. Also, the rate of change in water content is dependent on the pore water pressure during transient processes.
This data is defined at discrete points which SEEP/W uses to create spline interpolated smooth functions. These function plots can be printed or copied to the clipboard for importing into other Windows applications. The hydraulic conductivity can also be defined as anisotropic in two orthogonal directions.
Flux Quantities
SEEP/W computes the total flux across user defined lines drawn through all or part of the mesh. Single or multiple flux sections can be defined for the same problem.
Stop-Restart Solving
The processing function can be halted at any time and then later restarted. This allows flexibility in modifying boundary conditions and soil properties at intermediate stages during transient analyses.