Characterisation of the thermal effusivity of a partially saturated soil by the inverse method in the frequency domain

The purpose of this article is to present a method for identifying the apparent thermal effusivity of a wet soil. This thermal magnitude is indeed fundamentally important, as it fully characterises the behaviour of the system provided it is possible to make the assumption of a semi-infinite medium. The condition is very frequently encountered while studying heat transfers in soils. The apparent thermal effusivity of a soil is also particularly sensitive to the water content of the material. Because of this property, it is possible to evaluate the instantaneous water content of the medium from a correlation law linking thermal effusivity with water content.