The conference was a chance for earth science researchers from a wide variety of disciplines to share their experiences. The underlying physics of fluid flow in porous media is basically the same across different applications. A fluid doesn't care whether it's part of an environmental investigation or part of a geothermal study. Scientists working on nuclear waste clean-up, for instance, can model a toxic site and try out different strategies for cleaning it up, all on a computer. The software has been particularly useful at Yucca Mountain, Nevada, where DOE plans to construct a major facility for nuclear waste storage.
Numerical simulation plays a very large role in understanding the site.