Transport of water through smectite clay is strongly dependent on the microstructural constitution. Conceptual modeling of water percolation has been made and numerical 2D models employed for calculating the hydraulic conductivity have yielded good results. In practice, permeation takes place in 3D and the paper describes an attempt to develop such a model, assuming that flow takes place through capillary-filled channels formed by interconnected porous voids with higher porosity and conductivity than the clay matrix.
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