Spring 2025 Virtual Retreat
“Geochemical Reaction Modeling”
April 7–10, 2025

Immerse yourself with like-minded colleagues from around the world to learn the ins and outs of Geochemical Reaction Modeling at our Spring 2025 Virtual Retreat. Taking part in this instructor-led, hands-on retreat, you will learn to use The Geochemist's Workbench® software to create quantitative models of multicomponent reaction processes in isothermal and polythermal geochemical systems.

The Retreat will convene over four consecutive half-days, April 7–10 from 8:00 to 11:30 CDT (13:00 to 16:30 UTC).

What you will learn. Following a fully hands-on format, you will learn all the ins and outs of the GWB reaction modeling toolset. Specific topics covered include:

Aqueous speciation in natural waters
Accounting for redox disequilibrium
“Pitzer” activity models
GSS, the Geochemist's Spreadsheet
Reactions and reaction traces
Surface complexation modeling
The TEdit thermo dataset editor

Chemical buffers in the natural environment
Fluid mixing and scaling
Geothermometry
Waste injection wells
The Phase2 phase diagram generator
Modeling kinetic reactions
Overview of reactive transport modeling

The topics will be illustrated through a series of case studies.

Prerequisites: There are no advance requirements for this course, but we suggest you acquaint yourself with basic techniques for configuring the GWB apps.

More information? Contact workshop support. Can't come? Consider an alternative from our 2025 event schedule.

The [Johannesburg] workshop was good and quite informative, I'll be attending the one that you'll hold in Cape Town in 2016.

– Hlanganani Tutu, University of the Witwatersrand

Thanks again for a great course! I really learned a lot and am looking forward to putting it into practice.

– Andrew Wigston, Natural Resources Canada

Thank you for the GWB workshop—it was perfect! The tasks made the learning process really easy.

– Yuchen Liu, University of Illinois

Instructors

The retreat will be moderated by Brian Farrell and Jia Wang. Brian and Jia are Geochemists at Aqueous Solutions LLC, makers of The Geochemist's Workbench®.

Brian Farrell

Brian Farrell has many years of experience in developing and applying geochemical and reactive transport models. He is expert in aquifer microbiology, geochemical modeling, and reactive transport in geochemical systems. Brian has taught short courses in North and South America, Europe, Africa, Asia, and Australasia.

Jia Wang is an aqueous and isotope geochemist and a reactive transport modeler with special expertise in weathering and the critical zone. She has many years of experience as an instructor at the undergraduate and graduate levels, and as a noted mentor to less experienced students at the secondary through graduate levels.

Jia Wang

Registration

Space is limited, so sign up early. The retreat fee is US$749 until March 21, or $849 after that date.

A registration may be transfered to another participant at no charge, and is fully refundable until 30 days before the event.

Liability in the event of cancellation or other eventuality is limited to refund of the registration fee.

How to participate

Plan to enjoy this virtual retreat from the comfort of your own home or office! We will use a secure video conferencing platform that allows participants to ask questions, share their screens, and generally interact with the instructors and other participants.

Please plan to join the online meeting room from 13:00 to 16:30 UTC, or:

London	14:00–17:30
Paris	15:00–18:30
Beijing	21:00–00:30

San Francisco	06:00–09:30
Chicago	08:00–11:30
New York	09:00–12:30

Please expect an email containing a meeting ID and password in the days leading up to the event.

Before the retreat

As the retreat date approaches, please take note of the following:

About a week ahead of the event, we will send you a free 30-day license to The Geochemist's Workbench® Professional, along with the retreat schedule and two pdf files.
Please make sure GWB Professional is installed and activated on a computer running MS Windows before joining.
The first pdf file holds the complete set of PowerPoint slides to be shown by the instructors, in chronologic order, for your reference during and after the event.
We recommend you print and spiral bind the second pdf file, containing the workbook you will use to complete hands-on exercises.
We think you will be happiest if you have two computer screens available. That way, you will be able to take part in the event on one screen, while you use the other to run the software.

Sponsorship

The retreat is presented courtesy of Aqueous Solutions LLC, makers of The Geochemist's Workbench^® software package.