2009 — Peter Cook
Peter Cook, Ph.D., is a senior principal research scientist with CSIRO Land and Water. He received a B.A. in geography from Australian National University in 1986 and a Ph.D. in Earth sciences from Flinders University of South Australia in 1992. Between 1992 and 1994, Cook carried out postdoctoral research at the U.S. Department of Energy and University of Waterloo, Canada, before returning to Australia. Cook’s research interests span the fields of groundwater hydrology, ecohydrology, isotope hydrology, and unsaturated zone flow, but have mostly focused on the use of environmental tracers, including the integration of tracer and hydraulic methods. Specific research projects have involved estimation of aquifer recharge, quantification of groundwater, discharge to streams and wetlands, prediction of stream and groundwater salinization rates, and assessment of groundwater-dependent ecosystems. He has cowritten books on environmental tracers and ecohydrology.
"Environmental Tracers in Modern Hydrogeology: Reducing Uncertainty in Groundwater Flow Estimation" was the title of Cook's Darcy Lecture. Environmental tracers can reduce uncertainty of hydrogeological predictions in all environments, but are particularly valuable in highly heterogeneous systems, where spatial variations in aquifer hydraulic conductivity may range over several orders of magnitude, and so hydraulic approaches are inherently uncertain. Despite the rapid growth of environmental tracers during the past few decades and their adoption by the research community, they are not widely used in routine hydrogeological assessments. This lecture illustrated the potential of environmental tracers through illustration using field sites in North America and Australia, and discussed methods for bridging the gap between research and practice.
Quantitative hydrogeology is often traced back to Henry Darcy who, in the mid-19th century, observed a linear relationship between flow rate and hydraulic gradient, the proportionality constant later becoming known as hydraulic conductivity. Even today, groundwater flow rates are most frequently determined as the product of measured hydraulic gradients and hydraulic conductivities, the latter determined using pumping tests. Although the last 150 years have seen considerable improvements in interpretation of pumping tests, and understanding of isotropy and heterogeneity, estimation of aquifer hydraulic conductivity values at appropriate scales remains a significant source of uncertainty. Within the past few decades, however, environmental tracer methods have been developed that can provide independent estimates of groundwater flow rates, which have helped to overcome some of the problems associated with hydraulic approaches, particularly in heterogeneous systems. However, despite the ability of environmental tracers to constrain conceptual models of groundwater systems and significantly reduce uncertainties in prediction, the methods are underrepresented in hydrogeological textbooks and are still not widely used for hydrogeological assessment.
There are a large number of environmental tracers, all with different properties and hence different potential uses. While environmental tracers that readily undergo chemical reactions can sometimes be used to determine reaction pathways, tracers that behave more conservatively may yield information on transport processes. Calculation of groundwater residence times is one of the more common applications. Tracers that can be used for this purpose include radioactive isotopes, which decay at a known rate (e.g., 14C, 3H), tracers that are produced and accumulate in the subsurface (e.g., He), and tracers that are neither produced nor consumed in the subsurface, but have a variable and well-known input history (e.g., CFCs, SF6). Groundwater residence times in unconfined aquifers can be used to infer aquifer recharge rates, whereas in confined aquifers they allow quantification of horizontal flow velocities. Tracers present in much higher concentrations in groundwater than in surface water have great potential for quantifying groundwater discharge to surface water. In particular, dissolved gas tracers such as radon and helium will rapidly volatilize from surface water and so provide important tracers of recent groundwater inflow. Radon (with a half-life of 3.8 days), in particular, can be used in quantifying rates of groundwater discharge to streams, wetlands, and to the ocean, and also to determine the rate of water exchange between a river and its underlying hyporheic zone.
2008 — Michael Celia
Michael Celia, Ph.D., was the 2008 Darcy lecturer. He received a B.S. in civil engineering from Lafayette College in 1978, and an M.S. (1979) and Ph.D. (1983) in civil engineering from Princeton University. In 1985, he joined the faculty of MIT, returning to Princeton in 1989 to join the civil engineering faculty. Celia's areas of research include groundwater hydrology, ecohydrology, numerical modeling, contaminant transport simulation, and multiphase flow physics. Ongoing projects include pore-scale network modeling to study interface dynamics, reactive transport, and scaling in porous media systems; computational studies of plant responses to variations in soil moisture in water-stressed ecosystems, with a focus on applications in sub-Saharan Africa; and studies associated with large-scale injection of CO2 into deep brine formations as a possible mitigation strategy for the atmospheric carbon problem. The carbon work is part of a large multidisciplinary effort at Princeton known as the Carbon Mitigation Initiative. Celia served for 10 years as editor of the journal Advances in Water Resources. He is a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union and recipient of the 2005 AGU Hydrologic Sciences Award.
"Geological Storage as a Carbon Mitigation Option" was the title of Celia's 2008 Darcy Lecture. Anthropogenic emissions of CO2 have increased atmospheric concentration of CO2 by about 35 percent during the past 200 years. The current concentration, at about 385 ppm, represents the highest CO2 concentration in the last 500,000 years. Projected future emissions will lead to doubling of preindustrial CO2 concentration within the next 50 years. If this relentless increase of atmospheric CO2 is to be reduced, or reversed, technological solutions must be implemented on a massive scale. While many options are being considered, one attractive approach is carbon capture and storage, or CCS.
The "geological storage" version of CCS involves capture of CO2 before it is emitted into the atmosphere and subsequent injection of the CO2 into deep geological formations. Injection of CO2 into deep formations leads to a multiphase flow problem that may involve important mass exchange between phases, nonisothermal effects, and complex geochemical reactions. In addition, because enormous quantities of CO2 must be injected to have any significant impact on the atmospheric carbon problem, the spatial scale of the problem becomes very large.
Broad questions involving the fate of the injected CO2, including possible leakage of CO2 out of the formation, as well as the fate of displaced fluids like resident brines, lead to very challenging modeling and analysis problems. Because important leakage pathways can be very localized, and their properties can be highly uncertain, an overall analysis of the system requires resolution of multiple length scales in the context of a probabilistic approach. These requirements render standard numerical simulators ineffective due to excessive computational demands. A series of simplifying assumptions may be proposed to provide more efficient numerical calculations, even to the point of allowing for analytical or semianalytical solutions. Such simplifications, while restrictive in their assumptions, allow for large-scale analysis of leakage in a probabilistic framework while capturing much of the essential physics of the problem. Example calculations illustrate the utility of these methods, and show the current state of leakage estimation. They also lead to a proposal for specific field experiments that can reduce the uncertainty associated with potential leakage pathways.
2007 — James J. Butler Jr.
James J. Butler Jr., Ph.D., is a senior scientist in the Geohydrology Section of the Kansas Geological Survey at the University of Kansas, where he has worked since 1986. Butler also serves as an associate of the KU Center for East Asian Studies and as a courtesy professor in the KU Department of Geology. He has previously held visiting scientist positions in the Center of Applied Geoscience at the University of Tubingen (Germany) and in the Geohydrology Department of Sandia National Laboratory. Butler has also been a graduate researcher in the Institute of Geology of the State Seismological Bureau in Beijing, China.
Butler earned a B.S. in geology from the College of William and Mary, and an M.S. and Ph.D. in applied hydrogeology from Stanford University. His research interests include the development of field methods for site characterization and the assessment of hydrologic processes in stream-aquifer systems. Butler is the author of the book The Design, Performance, and Analysis of Slug Tests, as well as numerous scientific papers on various aspects of applied hydrogeology. He has served as an associate editor for Water Resources Research and the Journal of Hydrology, and is currently serving on the editorial boards of Ground Water® and the Hydrogeology Journal.
Darcy Lecture Series host institutions were able to select one of two lectures.
"Getting the Information Ground Water Modelers Need: A Report from the Field" was a methods-based presentation focusing on new technology for acquiring information about hydraulic conductivity at scales of relevance for investigations of groundwater, contamination. Better information on hydraulic conductivity improves both the accuracy of contaminant-transport predictions and the effectiveness of remediation systems. The lecture described the major elements of this new technology and presented a demonstration of its potential using results from an extensively studied unconsolidated aquifer.
"What the Heck Is a Phreatophyte? A Field Investigation of Ecohydrologic Processes in Stream-Aquifer Systems" was an overview of a multidisciplinary investigation of water use by phreatophytes—plants that utilize groundwater—in semiarid riparian zones. Groundwater consumption by nonnative phreatophytes is an issue of considerable concern in the western United States, as well as elsewhere. The lecture described the various components of the water budget in stream-aquifer systems, with an emphasis on the contribution of riparian zone phreatophytes. The presentation highlighted the ecohydrologic information embedded in water level data from shallow wells, and demonstrated its value for studies of riparian zones stressed by invasive phreatophytes and other factors.
2006 — Eileen Poeter
Eileen Poeter, Ph.D., the 2006 Darcy lecturer, is a professor of geological engineering at the Colorado School of Mines and director of the International Ground Water Modeling Center. Before entering academia, she worked for Golder Associates in the early 1980s and has continued to consult throughout her academic career.
Poeter earned a B.S. in geology from Lehigh University in 1975, and an M.S. in 1978 and a Ph.D. in 1980 in engineering science from Washington State University. Her research focuses on parameter estimation and multimodel evaluation and she is part of the JUPITER (Joint Parameter IdenTification and Evaluation of Reliability) development team.
JUPITER is an application-programming interface (API) intended to energize the science and technology of evaluating sensitivity, assessing data needs, estimating parameters, selecting/ranking models, and evaluating uncertainty. This API, and associated codes, are currently under development by the USGS, in coordination with the U.S. EPA to interface with their software modeling frameworks.
Poeter's lecture, "All Models Are Wrong: How Do We Know Which Are Useful?" detailed how the groundwater profession is searching for appropriate approaches to developing conceptual models, evaluating which are useful, and describing the uncertainty associated with their predictions.
Formulation of a reasonable set of alternative conceptual models coupled with quantitative representation is critical to the process, but is unfortunately more difficult than numerical modeling as it must address the realm of human nature and judgment. In addition, the problem is exacerbated by the dense, opaque character of the subsurface that makes data acquisition expensive, causing the work to be accomplished with sparse, uncertain information.
Nevertheless, movements to meet this challenge are gaining momentum in the groundwater profession. Poeter's presentation discussed available practical approaches to the problem in down-to-earth terms, as well as addressed future challenges.
2005 — Kip Solomon
Kip Solomon, Ph.D., was the 2005 Darcy lecturer. His education includes a Ph.D. in Earth sciences from the University of Waterloo, an M.S. in geology from the University of Utah, and a B.S. in geological engineering from the University of Utah.
He has been employed by the Department of Geology and Geophysics at the University of Utah since 1993 and is currently a professor and director of the Noble Gas Laboratory.
Solomon was appointed to the National Research Council's Committee on Improving Practices for Regulating and Managing Low-Activity Radioactive Waste in 2003. He is currently the first vice chair of the Hydrogeology Division of the Geological Society of America (GSA).
He was on the editorial board for Ground Water® from 1997 to 2001, and was the Joint Technical Program Chair for the GSA's annual meeting in 1997.
Solomon's lecture subject, "Inert Gas Tracers in Ground Water," illustrated the basic concepts of using inert gas tracers along with case studies that described their applications to real groundwater flow problems.
The case studies focused on groundwater dating, noble gas thermometry, or inject gas tracers, depending on the interests of the hosting institution.
2004 — Allen M. Shapiro
Allen M. Shapiro, Ph.D., is a research hydrologist with the USGS in Reston, Virginia.
His research has focused on characterizing groundwater flow and chemical transport in fractured rock. It has included investigations in various geologic settings, including fractured and dissolution-enhanced limestone, bedded sedimentary formations, and igneous and metamorphic rock.
Shapiro has authored papers on equipment design and field techniques, the interpretation of hydraulic and geochemical data, and theories of groundwater flow and chemical transport. His research has application to issues of societal importance, including water supply, groundwater contamination and restoration, waste isolation, and groundwater flow in the vicinity of engineered structures.
Shapiro earned a bachelor's degree in civil engineering from Lafayette College in Easton, Pennsylvania, and master's and Ph.D. degrees in civil and geological engineering from Princeton University.
Shapiro's lecture was titled "Recent Advances in Characterizing Ground Water Flow and Chemical Transport in Fractured Rock: From Cores to Kilometers."
The lecture discussed fractured rock aquifers, which provide water for domestic use, locations for isolating hazardous and toxic waste, and sites for foundations and infrastructure.
For these issues, the dimensions over which the characterization of groundwater flow and chemical transport needs to be conducted can range from meters to kilometers. Critical to the evaluation of these problems is how formation properties may vary over increasingly larger dimensions. Theoretical methods of scaling formation properties may not be successful in their application to fractured rock because of the structural complexity and extreme variability in the hydraulic properties of bedrock environments.
The influence of the physical dimensions of the problem on the magnitude of formation properties is viewed through the synthesis of laboratory studies, controlled field-scale experiments, and the interpretation of ambient groundwater flow and the spatial distribution of dissolved constituents, gases, and isotopes using groundwater flow and chemical-transport modeling.
2003 — Richelle Allen-King
Richelle Allen-King, Ph.D., an associate professor at University at Buffalo, was the 2003 lecturer. She received her Ph.D. from the Department of Earth Sciences, University of Waterloo, and a B.A. from the Department of Chemistry at the University of California, San Diego.
She has served on committees for the National Research Council and presently serves as a member of the Council's Water Science and Technology Board. She also serves as an associate editor for the journals Ground Water® and Water Resources Research.
Allen-King's research focuses on the geochemical processes that control the fate and transport of contaminants in ground and surface waters.
She offered a choice of two lectures: "A Hydrogeochemist's Perspective on Organic Contaminant Transport in Ground Water" or "Ground and Surface Water Contributions to Chemical Mass Discharge: Considering the Problem at Field and Basin Scales."
Host institutions selected the topic of greater interest.
The first topic was of interest to students who are comfortable with the basics of contaminant transport in porous media and the "ideal" model, and may be particularly well suited to programs that emphasize graduate education in hydrogeology, environmental engineering, or related disciplines.
The second topic was of interest to audiences representing a broad range of background and experience in earth sciences and related disciplines.
Go to a Web site about the Darcy Lecture Series prepared by Allen-King.
2002 — David Hyndman
David Hyndman, Ph.D., an associate professor in the Department of Geological Sciences at Michigan State University, was the Darcy lecturer in 2002.
He serves as an associate editor for both Ground Water® and Water Resources Research. His research focuses on: aquifer characterization methods using three-dimensional seismic, radar, and tracer data; modeling the impacts of land use on water quality; imaging contaminant plumes using ground-penetrating radar; the influence of seasonal recharge pulses on REDOX zonation; the design of bioremediation systems; and modeling microbial transport and contaminant biodegradation.
Hyndman lectured on "Efficient Large-Scale Bioremediation in a Heterogeneous Aquifer: The Schoolcraft Bioaugmentation Experiment." The presentation discussed how groundwater flow and contaminant transport models can be used both to design bioremediation systems and to evaluate the influence of heterogeneities on contaminant fate and transport. The Schoolcraft bioremediation system, which was developed as a multidisciplinary collaborative research effort between hydrogeologists, microbiologists, and environmental engineers, has achieved greater than 95 percent remediation efficiency over a period of three years.
2001 — Mary C. Hill
Mary C. Hill, Ph.D., a research scientist with the USGS in Boulder, Colorado, was the Henry Darcy Distinguished Lecturer in Ground Water Science for the year 2001.
Hill titled her 2001 lecture, "Guidelines for Effective Model Calibration (Any Model!)." During the presentation, Hill focused on how nonlinear regression and associated statistics can be used to dramatically improve how data are used to calibrate and test models. Examples were drawn from groundwater projects such as modeling of the Death Valley regional groundwater system, which underlies the Nevada Test Site and the proposed U.S. high-level nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain.
In addition to her work with the USGS, Hill is an adjunct professor at the Colorado School of Mines and the University of Colorado at Boulder. She is the author of the computer software MODFLOWP, the popular PCG2 solver for MODFLOW, and is a coauthor of the software UCODE and MODFLOW-2000. She has written articles on the numerical methods of solvers and nonlinear regression, confidence intervals, and calibration methodology.
Hill has conducted and consulted on numerous groundwater investigations involving numerical modeling, both nationally and internationally, during the past 20 years. She has dealt with situations involving salt water intrusion, groundwater supply and stream interaction, contaminant transport, and evaluation of regional round water flow. She is the 2000 recipient of the Walter L. Huber Research Prize, presented by the American Society of Civil Engineers. She holds an A.B. in geology from Hope College in Holland, Michigan, and M.S.E. and Ph.D. degrees in civil engineering from Princeton University.
2000 — M. James Hendry
M. James Hendry, Ph.D., of the University of Saskatchewan, Saskatchewan, Canada, was the lecturer in 2000.
His presentation, "Transport and Geochemical Controls on Solutes in Clay Aquitards," covered physical, hydrogeologic, chemical, isotopic, and biological information from aquitard systems.
Selected topics of his lecture included (1) a determination of the relative importance of advective, diffusive, and osmotic transport in the aquitards; (2) the usefulness of stable isotopes of water as tools to provide an understanding of the timing of major climatic and geologic events in aquitards, and (3) the geochemical controls on the dissolved ions and their implications for long-term solute migration in the aquitard system.
Hendry is a professor in the Department of Geological Sciences at the University of Saskatchewan. He holds an endowed Research Chair in Aqueous Geochemistry and is a Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada Industrial Research Chair. Dr. Hendry obtained his Ph.D. in earth sciences from the University of Waterloo in 1984. For the past 20 years, his research interests have included the fate and transport of solutes in low permeability geologic materials and biotic and abiotic reactions in natural unsaturated zones and uranium waste rock piles.
1999 — Scott Tyler
"Ground Water Recharge in Arid Regions: Questions About Today and the Past" was an introduction to transport through the vadose zone and explored new innovations for quantifying rates of groundwater recharge both under today's climate, as well as those of past climates. Recent innovations in the study of both the hydraulic and geochemical response of the vadose zone are discussed and several applications ranging from waste disposal to paleoclimatic interpretation were reviewed.
Scott W. Tyler, Ph.D., is a professor with the Desert Research Institute and the Department of Environmental and Resource Sciences at the University of Nevada, Reno. Tyler received his B.S. in mechanical engineering from the University of Connecticut, his M.S. degree in hydrogeology from the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology, and his Ph.D. in hydrogeology from the University of Nevada, Reno.
1998 — Barbara Sherwood-Lollar
Barbara Sherwood-Lollar, Ph.D., is an associate professor in the Department of Geology, University of Toronto, and Director of the Stable Isotope Laboratory in that department since 1991. She is a graduate of Harvard University and holds a Ph.D. in isotope geochemistry from the University of Waterloo. Sherwood-Lollar's specialization is the application of stable isotope geochemistry to gaseous and aqueous systems. Current work focuses on investigation of the origin, transport, and transformation of carbon-bearing compounds and contaminants (including light hydrocarbons and organic solvents) in groundwater and soils.
Her lecture, "Stable Carbon Isotopes: Tools for Direction of the Origin and Fate of the Envrionmental Contaminants," provided an introduction to environmental isotopes and to the latest technical developments in the application of geochemistry to contaminant hydrogeology. The lecture covered both the scientific basis for using isotopes to trace the source and fate of contaminants, as well as the implications for monitoring protocols and remediation schemes.
1997 — Philip C. Bennett
"Water, Microbes, and Rocks: The Geochemical Ecology of Contaminated Ground Water" was the title of the lecture given by Phillip C. Bennett, Ph.D. Bennett's lecture introduced the fundamentals of microbial degradation of hydrocarbons, but then went far beyond. Bennett's findings went deep into the geochemical changes in the aquifer and explored the implications of microbial activity upon the weathering of silicates. Bennett received a B.S. from The Evergreen State College, and M.S. in environmental science from the State University of New York, College of the Environmental Science and Forestry, and a Ph.D. in geology from Syracuse University.
Bennett delivered his lecture at 39 academic sites in United States, Canada, Australia, England, and Germany during the 1997 academic year.
1996 — Linda Abriola
"Organic Liquid Contaminant Entrapment and Persistence in the Subsurface: Interphase Mass Transfer Limitations and Implications for Remediation" was the title of the lecture presented by Linda Abriola, Ph.D. The lecture presented an overview of collaborative research conducted at The University of Michigan during the last five years to elucidate and quantify the processes controlling interphase mass transfer in multiphase subsurface environments. Abriola received a B.S.E. in civil engineering from Drexel University, and M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in civil engineering from Princeton University. For the past 12 years she has been involved in research exploring the transport and fate of organic contaminants in groundwater and soils.
Abriola's lecture was heard by more than 4000 persons at 33 locations in the United States, Canada, Switzerland, Germany, France, and England.
1995 — Paul Hseih
"A Multidisciplinary, Multiscale Investigation of Fluid Flow and Solute Transport in Fractured Crystalline Rocks: Finds from the Mirror Lake Site, New Hampshire" was the title of Darcy Lecture made by Paul Hseih, Ph.D. Hseih received a B.S. in civil engineering from Princeton University, and a M. S. and Ph.D. in hydrology from the University of Arizona. Since 1997, he has worked as a hydrologist in the research program of the U. S. Geological Survey and at the time of the lecture was stationed in Menlo Park, California.
Dr. Hseih's lecture was heard by more than 5000 persons at 57 locations in the United States, Canada, Germany, France, Spain, the United Kingdom, and South Africa.
1994 — Edward Sudicky
"Contaminant Migration in Complex-Structure Porous and Fractured-Porous Geologic Media: A Simulation Perspective" was the title of the Darcy Lecture given by Edward Sudicky, Ph.D. Professor Sudicky received his Ph.D. in earth sciences from the University of Waterloo in 1983 where he is currently an associate professor and a member of the Waterloo Centre for Groundwater Research. His specific interests include the development of analytical and numerical models for application to a variety of groundwater problems, field studies of the spatial variability of flow and contaminant transport parameters, geostatistics, tracer tests, and stochastic approaches to subsurface flow and transport. At the time of his lecture, he had been involved since 1983 in research focused on both field and numerical simulation studies of contaminant migration processes in heterogeneous geological materials.
Sudicky's lecture was heard by more than 3500 persons at 41 academic sites in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, and Israel.
1993 — Mary Jo Baedecker
"The Fate of Organic Compounds and Geochemical Processes in Contaminated Aquifers" was the title of the Darcy Lecture presented by Mary Jo Baedecker, Ph.D. Baedecker is a research chemist at the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) in Reston, Virginia. She is a graduate of Vanderbilt University and holds an M.S. degree in chemistry from the University of Kentucky and a Ph.D. in geochemistry from The George Washington University. She spent five years in research of the organic geochemistry of marine sediments at the Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics at the University of California, Los Angeles, and has been in the research program of the USGS for 17 years. Dr. Baedecker's current interests are in the field of environmental geochemistry, and primary organic and inorganic geochemistry of contaminated aquifers. Her work focuses on understanding the fate of organic compounds on groundwater chemistry and the aquifer matrix. She has worked on waste and petroleum products. Baedecker has written for many scientific publications and is adjunct professor at The George Washington University.
Baedecker delivered her lecture at 28 sites across the United States and Canada.
1992 — John Wilson
"Visualization of Ground Water Flow and Transport Through a Microscope" was the topic of Darcy Lecture given by John Wilson, Ph.D. Wilson is the professor of Hydrology and director of the Hydrology Program at the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology in Socorro, New Mexico. He is a B.C.E. graduate of the Georgia Institute of Technology and holds M.S., C.E., and Ph.D. degrees from The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He taught groundwater at MIT for eight years and then spent a year with Intera Inc., before joining the Hydrology Program in Socorro in 1984. Wilson's present-day research interests include the fundamental fluid mechanics of permeable media flow and transport, primarily using flow visualization tools and mathematical modeling. Through this work, he has been examining the movement of nonaqueous phase liquids and colloids in porous and fractured media. He has other research efforts directed toward well head protection, flow through heterogeneous media, and the geological characterization of aquifers. Wilson has written for many publications and is a member of a variety of professional committees and panels.
Wilson delivered his lecture at 37 universities and delivered the Darcy lecture as the keynote address at the AGWSE General Membership Meeting at the National Convention in Las Vegas.
1991 — Stephen Wheatcraft
"Fractal Approaches to Modeling Geologic Variability in Aquifers" was the topic of the lecture presented by Stephen Wheatcraft, Ph.D. Wheatcraft has more than 17 years experience in the field of hydrogeology and transport in porous media. He has been published in more than 30 scientific publications in the areas of contaminant transport in aquifers and soils, hydrogeophysics, island/costal hydrogeology, and numerical and laboratory modeling of sea water intrusion. He currently holds the position of associate research professor of Hydrogeology at the Water Resources Center of the Desert Research Institute. He received an M.S. in 1976 and a Ph.D. in geology and geophysics with specialization in hydrogeology from the University of Hawaii. His master's thesis involved laboratory modeling of sea water intrusion and liquid waste injection into island aquifers. His dissertation involved the numerical modeling of the same problem.
Wheatcraft lectured at 30 universities in 1991 and delivered the Darcy Lecture as the keynote address at the AGWSE General Membership Meeting in Washington, D.C., on October 22, 1991.
1990 — Ralph C. Heath
"Hydrogeology and Hazardous Waste Disposal" was the title of Ralph C. Heath's Darcy Lecture. Topics covered in the lecture included engineered solutions to waste disposal and a discussion of the hydrogeologic features, which, if properly considered and utilized, may help avoid the problems that have resulted from past disposal practices. Heath spent 34 years working for the U.S. Geological Survey's Water Resources Division and since 1986 has practiced as a self-employed consulting hydrogeologist. As a consultant, he is involved in projects ranging from groundwater pollution caused by power plant ash ponds to determining the yield of the unconfined aquifer at Cape Hatteras, North Carolina. He also holds the position of lecturer at Duke University, where he teaches both regular and intensive courses in basic groundwater hydrology.
Heath delivered the keynote address to the AGWSE General Membership at the NWWA National Meeting in Anaheim, California, in September 1990, and 22 universities in the United States and Canada.
1989 — Randy L. Bassett
"The Utility of Chemical Modeling, With and Without Advection, in Natural and Environmentally Stressed Hydrologic Systems" was the title of the Darcy Lecture presented by Randy L. Bassett, Ph.D. After receiving his Ph.D. from Stanford University in 1977, his career has been diverse. He has been actively involved in government research projects, university research, the private sector, and began his own research consulting firm. In 1987, he joined the faculty at the University of Arizona, Department of Hydrology, as an associate professor, where he is involved with research projects in aqueous chemical modeling, stable isotope geochemistry, organic and trace metal waste migration studies of mining activities, and brine modeling in sedimentary basins.
Bassett lectured at 19 universities and delivered the keynote address to the AGWSE National General Membership Meeting at the NWWA Annual Convention in Houston, Texas, in 1989.
1988 — Thomas A. Prickett
"Practical Aspects of Ground Water Modeling" was the topic of Thomas A. Prickett's Darcy Lecture Series. Prickett lectured throughout the world and consulted in almost every state in the United States. He was widely renowned in the scientific community for his work with groundwater models. After receiving a degree in engineering, he began his career with the Illinois State Water Survey before becoming a consultant. He established his own firm, Thomas A. Prickett and Associates, in 1981.
Prickett delivered his Darcy lecture to 16 universities and was the AGWSE keynote speaker at the NWWA Annual Convention in Las Vegas, Nevada, in 1988.
1987 — John A. Cherry
"Contaminant Migration Processes: A Field Perspective" was the topic of the first Henry Darcy Lecture presented by John Cherry, Ph.D., professor, University of Waterloo. For the past 17 years, his research interests have focused on field studies of contaminant migration processes by way of investigations of active or inactive waste disposal or spill sites, controlled field experiments with emphasis on both physical and geochemical processes, and development of monitoring systems to better elucidate processes at the field scale. He has been active as a consultant to various government agencies and corporations in the United States and Canada.
Cherry lectured at 16 universities in the United States and Canada, and delivered his Darcy lecture to the AGWSE General Membership as the keynote address at the NGWA National Meeting in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in 1987.