• Journal of the Korean GEO-environmental Society
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.67-76
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• 2006

For a hydro power plant project, the headrace tunnel having a finished diameter of 3.3 m was constructed in volcanic rocks with well-developed vertical joint and high groundwater table. The intake facility was located 20.3km upstream of the powerhouse and headrace tunnel of 20km in length and penstock of 440m in height connected the intake and the powerhouse. The typical caldera lake, Lake Toba set the geology at the site the caving of the ground caused tension cracks in the vertical direction to be developed and initial stresses at the ground to be released. High groundwater table(the maximum head of 20bar) in the area of well-connected vertical joints delayed the progress of tunnel excavation severely due to the excessive inflow of groundwater. The excavation of tunnel was made using open-shield type TBM and mucking cars on the rail. High volume of water inflowraised the water level inside tunnel to 70cm, 17% of tunnel diameter (3.9m) and hindered the mucking of spoil under water. To improve the productivity, several adjustments such as modification of TBM and mucking cars and increase in the number of submersible pumps were made forthe excavation of severe water inflow zone. Since the ground condition encountered during excavation turned out to be much worse, it was decided to adopt PC segment lining instead of RC lining. Besides, depending on the conditions of the water inflow, rock mass condition and internal water pressure, one of the invert PC segment lining with in-situ RC lining, RC lining and steel lining was applied to meet the site specific condition. With the adoption of PC segment lining, modification of TBM and other improvement, the excavation of the tunnel under severe groundwater condition was successfully completed.

• Proceedings of the Korean Geotechical Society Conference
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• 2010.03a
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• pp.523-534
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• 2010

A hybrid system of soil-nailing and compression anchor is proposed in this paper; the system is composed of an anchor bar (installed at the tip) with two PC strands and a steel bar. After drilling a hole, installing proposed hybrid systems, and filling the hole with grouting material, prestress is applied to the anchor bar to restrict the deformation at the head and/or to prevent shallow slope failures. However, since the elongation rate of PC strand is much larger than that of steel bar, yield at the steel bar will occur much earlier than the PC strand. It means that the yield load of the hybrid system will be overestimated if we simply add yield loads of the two - anchor bar and PC strands. It might be needed to try to match the yielding time of the two materials by applying the prestress to the anchor bar. It means that the main purpose of applying prestress to the anchor bar should be two-fold: to restrict the deformation at the nail head; and more importantly, to maximize the design load of the hybrid system by utilizing load transfer mechanism that transfers the prestress applied at the tip to the head through anchor bar. In order to study the load transfer mechanism in a systematic way, in-situ pullout tests were performed with the following conditions: soil-nailing only; hybrid system with the variation of prestress stresses from 0kN to 196kN. It was found that the prestress applied to the anchor system will induce the compressive stress to the steel bar; it will result in decrease in the slope of load-displacement curve of the steel bar. Then, the elongation at which the steel bar will reach yield stress might become similar to that of PC strands. By taking advantage of prestress to match elongations at yield, the pullout design load of the hybrid system can be increased up to twice that of the soil-nailing system.

• Journal of Korean Tunnelling and Underground Space Association
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• v.20 no.6
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• pp.1003-1022
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• 2018

In the current work, a series of three-dimensional finite element analyses were carried out to understand the behaviour of a pre-existing single pile to the changes of the tunnel face pressures when a shield TBM tunnel passes underneath the pile. The numerical modelling analysed the results by considering various face pressures (25~100% of the in-situ horizontal stress prior to tunnelling at the tunnel springline). In the numerical modelling, several key issues, such as the pile settlements, the axial pile forces, the shear stresses have been thoroughly analysed for different face pressures. The head settlements of the pile with the maximum face pressure decreased by about 44% compared to corresponding settlement with the minimum face pressure. Furthermore, the maximum axial force of the pile developed with the minimum face pressure. The tunnelling-induced axial pile force at the minimum face pressure was found to be about 21% larger than that with the maximum face pressure. It has been found that the ground settlements and the pile settlements are heavily affected by the face pressures. In addition, the influence of the piles and the ground was analysed by considering characteristics of the soil deformations. Also, the apparent safety factor of the piles are substantially reduced for all the analyses conducted in the current simulation, resulting in severe effects on the adjacent piles. Therefore, the behaviour of the piles, according to change the face pressures, has been extensively examined and analysed by considering the key features in great details.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.297-307
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• 2014

Cavern Thermal Energy Storage system stores thermal energy in caverns to recover industrial waste heat or avoid the sporadic characteristics of renewable-energy resources, and its advantages include high injection-and-extraction powers and the flexibility in selecting a storage medium. In the present study, the structural stability of rock mass pillar between these silo-type storage caverns was assessed using a coupled thermal-mechanical model in $FLAC^{3D}$. The results of numerical simulations showed that thermal stresses due to long-term storage depended on pillar width and had significant effect on the pillar stability. A sensitivity analysis of main factors indicated that the influence on the pillar stability increased in the order cavern depth < pillar width < in situ condition. It was suggested that two identical caverns should be separated by at least one diameter of the cavern and small-diameter shaft neighboring the cavern should be separated by more than half of the cavern diameter. Meanwhile, when the line of centers of two caverns was parallel to the direction of maximum horizontal principal stress, the shielding effect of the caverns could minimize an adverse effect caused by a large horizontal stress.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.15 no.2 s.55
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• pp.157-167
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• 2005

Current initial rock stress state is one of the key factors required to evaluate the stability and failure around an excavated opening and its importance increases as the construction depth become deeper and the scale of the rock structure become larger. In this paper, the study was performed to evaluate the characteristics of the regional stress state at Chuncheon-Yanggu mountainous region, the East-North part of Kyeonggi Massif. Forty nine field stress measurements in 9 boreholes were conducted at the depth from 20 m to 290 m by hydraulic fracturing method. The fracturing tracing works were carried out by acoustic televiewer scanning. The study results revealed that the different intial rock stress states presented at different formation rock type and the excessive horizontal stress state with stress ratio(K) close to 3.0 was measured at the depth of 200 m and deeper in the intrusive unite body of the study area. The results from the investigation of excessive horizontal stress and its effect on failure mode showed that there exist several points where the localized excessive horizontal stresses are big enough to potentially induce brittle failures around the future openings greater than 100 m in depth within the granite body of the study area.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.25 no.10
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• pp.17-30
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• 2009

Underground construction such as tunneling can induce damages on the surrounding rock mass, due to the stress concentration of in situ stresses and excessive energy input during construction sequence, such as blasting. The developed damage on the rock mass can have substantial influence on the mechanical and hydraulic behaviors of the rock masses around a tunnel. In this study, investigation on the generation of damage around an opening in a jointed rock model under biaxial compression condition was conducted. The joint dip angles employed are 30, 45, and 60 degrees to the horizontal, and the synthetic rock mass was made using early strength cement and water. From the biaxial compression test, initiation and propagation of tensile cracks at norm to the joint angle were found. The propagated tensile cracks eventually developed rock blocks, which were dislodged from the rock mass. Furthermore, the propagation process of the tensile cracks varies with joint angle: lower joint angle model shows more stable and progressive tensile crack propagation. The development of the tensile crack can be explained under the hypothesis that the rock segment encompassed by the joint set is subjected to the developing moment, which can be induced by the geometric irregularity around the opening in the rock model. The experiment results were simulated by using discrete element method PFC 2D. From the simulation, as has been observed from the test, a rock mass with lower joint angle produces wider damage region and rock block by tensile cracks. In addition, a rock model with lower joint angle shows progressive tensile cracks generation around the opening from the investigation of the interacted tensile cracks.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.20 no.4
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• pp.267-276
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• 2010

In modern rock engineering practice, fully grouted rock bolting is actively employed as a major supporting system, so that understanding the behavior of fully grouted rock bolts is essential for the precise design of rock bolting. Despite its importance, the supporting mechanism of rock bolts has not been fully understood yet. Since most of existing analytical models for rock bolts were developed by drastically simplifying their boundary conditions, they are not suitable for the bolts of in-situ condition. In this study, 3-D elastic FE analysis of fully grouted rock bolts has been conducted to provide insight into the supporting mechanism of the bolt. The distribution of shear and axial stresses along the bolt are investigated with the consideration of different boundary conditions including three different displacement boundary conditions at the bolt head, the presence of intersecting rock joints, and the variation of elastic modulus of adjacent rock. The numerical result reveals that installation of the faceplate at the bolt head plays an important role in mobilizing the supporting action and enhancing the supporting capabilities of the fully grouted rock bolts.

• Journal of the Korean GEO-environmental Society
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.5-12
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• 2016

Investigation of in-situ ground in cold region is difficult due to low accessibility and environmental factors. In this study, correlation between dynamic cone resistance and shear strength is suggested to estimate the strength of frozen soils by using instrumented dynamic cone penetrometer. Tests were conducted in freezing chamber after preparing sand-silt mixture with 2.3% water content. Vertical stresses of 5 kPa and 10 kPa were applied during freezing, shearing, and penetration phase to compare the dynamic cone resistance and shear strength. The dynamic cone resistance, additionally, is calculated to minimize the effect of energy loss during hammer impact. Experimental results show that as the shear strength increases, the dynamic cone penetration index (DCPI) decreases nonlinearly, while the dynamic cone resistance increases linearly. This study provides the useful correlation to evaluate strength properties of the frozen soils from the dynamic cone penetration and direct shear tests.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.13-30
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• 2013

Increase of pore fluid pressure resulting from injection of $CO_2$ may reactivate pre-existing faults, and the induced seismic activities can raise the safety issues such as seal integrity, restoration of storage capacity, and, in the worst case, removal of previously injected $CO_2$. Thus, fault stability and potential for $CO_2$ leakage need to be assessed at the stage of site selection and planning of injection pressure, based on the results of large-scale site investigations and numerical modeling for various scenarios. In this report, studies on the assessment of fault stability during injection of $CO_2$ were reviewed. The seismic activities associated with an artificial injection of fluids or a release of naturally trapped high-pressure fluids were first examined, and then site investigation methods for the magnitude and orientation of in situ stresses, the distribution and change of pore fluid pressure, and the location of faults were generally summarized. Recent research cases on possibility estimation of fault reactivation, prediction of seismic magnitude, and modeling of $CO_2$ leakage through a reactivated fault were presented.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.63-71
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• 2020

Strength anisotropy is a typical feature of thin-bedded rock masses and their strength will be degraded subjected to water immersion effect. Such effect is crucial for the operation of hydropower plant because the impoundment lifts the water level of upstream reservoir and causes the rock mass of nearby slopes saturated. So far, researches regarding mechanical property of natural thin-bedded rock masses and their strength variation under water immersion based on field test method are rarely reported. This paper focuses on a thin-bedded stratified rock mass and carries out field test to investigate the mechanical property and strength variation characteristics. The field test is highlighted by samples which have a large shear dimension of 0.5 m*0.5 m, representing a more realistic in-situ situation than small size specimen. The test results confirm the anisotropic nature of the concerned rock mass, whose shear strength of host rocks is significantly larger than that of bedding planes. Further, the comparison of shear strength parameters of the thin-bedded rock mass under natural and saturated conditions show that for both host rocks and bedding planes, the decreasing extent of cohesion values are larger than friction values. The quantitative results are then adopted to analyze the influence of reservoir impoundment of a hydropower plant on the surrounding rock mass stability of diversion tunnels which are located in the nearby slope bank. It is evaluated that after reservoir impoundment, the strength degradation induced incremental deformations of surrounding rock mass of diversion tunnels are small and the stresses in lining structure are acceptable. It is therefore concluded that the influences of impoundment are small and the stability of diversion tunnels can be still achieved. The finings regarding field test method and its results, as well as the numerical evaluation conclusions are hoped to provide references for rock projects with similar concerns.