Redundant and Nonredundant Information for Model Calibration or Hydraulic Tomography

Drawdown data from independent pumping tests have widely been used to validate the estimated hydraulic parameters from inverse modeling or hydraulic tomography (HT). Yet, the independent pumping test has not been clearly defined. Therefore, the goal of this paper is to define this independent pumping test concept, based on the redundant or nonredundant information about aquifer heterogeneity embedded in the observed heads during cross‐hole pumping tests. The definition of complete, moderate redundancy and high nonredundancy of information are stipulated using cross‐correlation analysis of the relationship between the head and heterogeneity. Afterward, data from numerical experiments and field sequential pumping test campaigns reinforce the concept and the definition. Article impact statement: The concept of complete, moderate redundancy, and high nonredundancy of head data sets can be validated by hydraulic tomography.