ABSTRACT

Aquifer simulation models have been used to examine the effects of various groundwater management strategies. Use has primarily been of the "case study" or "what-if" type. Optimization methods have been used in groundwater management for more than a decade with some success. Groundwater management problems have been looked at using optimal control approaches such as differential dynamic programming (DDP). The groundwater flow generally is to the east in the outcrop area and then bends to the north toward Barton Springs. Gorelick reviewed simulation-management models and classified hydraulic management models into two major approaches: embedding and use of a unit response matrix or an "algebraic technological function" (ATF). The work described attempts to obtain the generality of the hydraulic simulation-management model in combining simulation and optimization to solve the optimal control problem. The difference equations relating the heads and the well flows in the aquifer are also constraints of the optimization.