Abstract
This paper develops a numerical procedure to back-analyse the horizontal and vertical permeabilities for saturated zone, from the measured time-history of ground water level. By using a combination of saturated and unsaturated seepage analysis by finite element method and of mathematical programming technique, the procedure allows to seek the unknown permeabilities which minimize the difference between calculated and measured time-histories of free surface position. The validity of the procedure is verified by calibrating the performance of the procedure being applied to hypothetical case studies.
