Surface Water Interaction Modelling Using Visual MODFLOW and GIS

PHYLARESDescription of the study area / ch.4__________________________________________________________________________________________19Chapter 4Description of the study area4.1 Geographical locationBelgium is a small country in Western Europe bordering the North Sea, between France and theNetherlands (Figure 4.1) with a total area of 30,528 sq km (CIA world fact) covers a land area of30,278 sq km and water covers 250 sq km of the area. The geography of Belgium, with thegeographic coordinate of 50° 50'N, 4° 00’E, shows to have three different areas: lower Belgium(up to 100 m above sea level), Central Belgium (between 100 and 200 m above sea level) andUpper Belgium (from 200 to over 500m above sea level, with the highest point at an elevation of694 meters above sea level..Flanders is one of the three regions of Belgium and it is situated on the Northern part of Belgiumand covers an area of 13.524 km 2 (44% of Belgium), bordered by Netherlands and France.Among the major rivers of Flanders, Nete is one of them. Nete Basin covers an area of 1672.6km 2. The area used for the modeling in this thesis is found at the Eastern part of the Nete area,NE of Antwerp, Belgium.Figure 4. 1 Geographical Location of Belgium (from the World Atlas Map)______________________________________________________________________________________Groundwater – Surface water interaction modeling using visual MODFLOW and GIS