Site investigation and design of the monitoring system at the Sant`Alessio Induced RiverBank Filtration plant (Lucca, Italy)

Abstract

Innovative water management strategies such as the storage of reclaimed water or excess water from different sources in Managed Aquifer Recharge (MAR) schemes can greatly increase water availability and therefore improve water security in the Mediterranean area. The Sant'Alessio well field will be used, within the framework of the MARSOL EU FPVII-ENV-2013 project, to demonstrate the sustainability, by a technical, social and market point of view, and the benefits of managing Induced Riverbank Filtration, one of the most common MAR techniques, versus the unmanaged option. Along with a detailed hydrogeological and hydrogeochemical site characterization a Wireless Sensor Network to monitor quantitatively and qualitatively the hydrologic variables in the river water, in the aquifer and in the well field has been designed. In this paper we present the test site, the investigations performed and the design of the monitoring system along with a brief overview of the Decision Support System (DSS) under development to control the whole monitoring devices. The DSS along with the monitoring system will constitute a prototype whose potential market exploitation will be tested.