Modelisation of solute transport in non saturated porous media

Modelisation of solute transport in non saturated porous media is tackled by the thermodynamics of irreversible processes (TIP). This approach permits to obtain all physical laws or effects rigorously from the expression of entropy source associated to dissipative phenomena. Fourier's law, Fick's law or Darcy law but also coupled effects like Soret effect (thermal gradient influence on the solute mass flux in the liquid phase) or thermodiffusion (thermal flux influence on vapor diffusion). The water phase transition and the solute adsorption by the solid matrix are taken into account. The final model may be applied in several fields such as civil engineering, agronomy, pollution and the assessment of radioactive waste repositories. A numerical modelisation is in the process of implementation in the french software "CESAR-LCPC" of the "Laboratoire Central des Fonts et chaussees".