Green element simulations of the transient nonlinear unsaturated flow equation (Q1909475)

The paper presents numerical solutions to transient one-dimensional and two-dimensional nonlinear flows in unsaturated media which are based on the Green element method (GEM). GEM is a novel numerical scheme based essentially on the singular integral theory of the boundary element method but which implements the theory in an element-by-element fashion so that when the discrete equations from all the elements are assembled, the resultant global coefficient matrix is banded and easier to invert. The method is tested on four examples of infiltration flow problems whose soil constitutive relations cover most of those reported in the literature.