Frozen soil has a major effect in many hydrologic processes, and its impacts are difficult to predict. A prime example is flood forecasting during spring snowmelt within the Canadian Prairies. One key driver for the extent of flooding is the antecedent soil moisture and the possibility for water to infiltrate into (partly) frozen soils. Therefore, these situations are crucial for accurate flood prediction at every spring. The main objective of this study was to evaluate the water flow and heat transport within available hydrological models to predict the impact of frozen and partly frozen soil on infiltration and percolation. A standardized data set was developed for water flow and heat transport into (partial) frozen soil by laboratory experiments using fine sand within a one-dimensional (1-D) soil column. A 1-D soil column having a length of 107 cm and diameter of 35.6 cm was built and equipped with insulation to limit heat exchange only through the soil surface. A data logger collected the moisture content and temperature by five FDR sensors which have been installed at a distance of 15 cm from each other. During the experiments, temperature, soil moisture, and percolated water was observed at different freezing conditions (-5°C, -10°C, and -15°C) as well as at thawing conditions when the air temperature was increased to +5°C. Distribution of soil moisture and soil temperature in the soil column was plotted for the experimental data over the freezing and thawing period. As some of the water in the soil begins to freeze, a decrease in water content was observed with a sudden increase in soil temperature near 0°C or slightly below of 0°C. This was, in fact, only a decrease in unfrozen water, not a decrease in total water content and was caused by the latent heat during freezing. Soil temperature showed noticeable differences at the top and the bottom of soil column during the change of state of water. The heat flux at the lower soil column was strongly limited due to iii the overlying soil. Thus, the soil temperature at the lowest sensors stayed in a freezing condition over several days and was not changing the temperature due to the latent heat which was released during the freezing process. Significant variation in soil moisture content was found between the top and the bottom of the soil column at the starting of the thawing period. However, with increasing temperature, the lower depth of the soil column showed higher moisture content as the soil was enriched with moisture with higher transmission rate due to the release of heat by soil particles during the thawing cycle. The soil system did not remain in the isothermal state during the thawing cycle. Although gravitational gradient was mainly responsible for the infiltration rate into the partially frozen soil, the distribution of moisture was greatly influenced by the temperature gradient. Vadose zone modeling using HYDRUS-1D was applied to the data set. Numerical results of the modeling were calibrated using the experimental results. It showed that the newly developed benchmark data set were useful for the validation of numerical models. The use of such a validated freezing and thawing module implemented into larger scale hydrologic models will directly reduce the prediction uncertainty during flood forecasting. Moreover, these benchmark data sets will be useful for the validation of numerical models and for developing scientific knowledge to suggest potential code variations or new code development in numerical models. / February 2017

The need to consider groundwater and surface water as a single resource has fostered the interest of the scientific community on the interactions between surface water and groundwater. The region below and alongside rivers where surface hydrology and subsurface hydrology concur is the hyporheic zone. This is the region where water exchange determines many biogeochemical and ecological processes of great impact on the functioning of rivers. However, the complex processes taking place in the hyporheic zone require a multidisciplinary approach. The combination of innovative point and distributed techniques originally developed in separated disciplines is of great advantage for the indirect identification of water exchange in the hyporheic zone. Distributed techniques using temperature as a tracer such as fiber-optic distributed temperature sensing can identify the different components of groundwater-surface water interactions based on their spatial and temporal thermal patterns at the sediment-water interface. In particular, groundwater, interflow discharge and local hyporheic exchange flows can be differentiated based on the distinct size, duration and sign of the temperature anomalies. The scale range and resolution of fiber-optic distributed temperature sensing are well complemented by geophysics providing subsurface structures with a similar resolution and scale. Thus, the use of fiber-optic distributed temperature sensing to trace flux patterns supported by the exploration of subsurface structures with geophysics enables spatial and temporal investigation of groundwater-surface water interactions with an unprecedented level of accuracy and resolution. In contrast to the aforementioned methods that can be used for pattern identification at the interface, other methods such as point techniques are required to quantify hyporheic exchange fluxes. In the present PhD thesis, point methods based on hydraulic gradients and thermal profiles are used to quantify hyporheic exchange flows. However, both methods are one-dimensional methods and assume that only vertical flow occurs while the reality is much more complex. The study evaluates the accuracy of the available methods and the factors that impact their reliability. The applied methods allow not only to quantify hyporheic exchange flows but they are also the basis for an interpretation of the sediment layering in the hyporheic zone. For upscaling of the previous results three-dimensional modelling of flow and heat transport in the hyporheic zone combines pattern identification and quantification of fluxes into a single framework. Modelling can evaluate the influence of factors governing groundwater-surface water interactions as well as assess the impact of multiple aspects of model design and calibration of high impact on the reliability of the simulations. But more importantly, this modelling approach enables accurate estimation of water exchange at any location of the domain with unparalleled resolution. Despite the challenges in 3D modelling of the hyporheic zone and in the integration of point and distributed data in models, the benefits should encourage the hyporheic community to adopt an integrative approach comprising from the measurement to the upscaling of hyporheic processes.