Groundwater level monitoring using a plastic optical fiber

The present work describes the testing and application of a low cost plastic optical fiber sensor on the monitoring of groundwater levels. Two sensors with different grove depth (1/2 and 1/4 of the core thickness) and a resolution of 20 cm along 2 m of the optical fiber were produced and tested. The sensors were tested under two experimental setups: water level variation (increasing and decreasing of the water level) and groundwater increase simulation, in a soil column. The analysis of the optical signal's amplitude and its variations due to the increasing or decreasing of water level showed that both tested sensors presented an appropriate performance and adequate sensibility to groundwater level variation and, therefore, can be used for in situ applications of monitoring. (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.