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Experimental and numerical interpretation on composite foundation consisting of soil-cement column within warm and ice-rich frozen soil

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Abstract

Affected by climate warming and anthropogenic disturbances, the thermo-mechanical stability of warm and ice-rich frozen ground along the Qinghai-Tibet engineering corridor (QTEC) is continuously decreased, which may delay the construction of major projects in the future. In this study, based on chemical stabilization of warm and ice-rich frozen ground, the soil-cement column (SCC) for ground improvement was recommended to reinforce the foundations in warm and ice-rich permafrost regions. To explore the validity of countermeasures mentioned above, both the original foundation and the composite foundation consisting of SCC with soil temperature of -1.0°C were prepared in the laboratory, and then the plate loading tests were carried out. The laboratory investigations indicated that the bearing capacity of composite foundation consisting of SCC was higher than that of original foundation, and the total deformation of original foundation was greater than that of composite foundation, meaning that overall stability of foundation with warm and ice-rich frozen soil can be improved by SCC installation. Meanwhile, a numerical model considering the interface interaction between frozen soil and SCC was established for interpretating the bearing mechanism of composite foundation. The numerical investigations revealed that the SCC within composite foundation was responsible for the more applied load, and the applied load can be delivered to deeper zone in depth due to the SCC installation, which was favorable for improving the bearing characteristic of composite foundation. The investigations provide the valuable guideline for the choice of engineering supporting techniques to major projects within the QTEC.

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Acknowledgments

This research was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 41471062, No. 41971085, No. 41971086).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Civil Engineering, Hebei University of Engineering, Handan, 056038, China

    Honglei Wang

  2. State Key Laboratory of Frozen Soil Engineering, Northwest Institute of Eco-Environment and Resources, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Lanzhou, 730000, China

    Honglei Wang, Jianming Zhang & Zhizhong Sun

  3. Second Geological Brigade, Bureau of Geology and Mineral Resources Exploration and Development, Lhasa, 850000, China

    Shoucai Wei

  4. Da Xing’anling Observation and Research Station of Frozen Ground Engineering and Environment, Northwest Institute of Eco-Environment and Resources, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Jiagedaqi, 165100, China

    Zhizhong Sun

  5. School of Civil Engineering, Northeast Forestry University, Harbin, 150040, China

    Hu Zhang

Authors
  1. Honglei Wang
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  2. Jianming Zhang
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Contributions

WANG Honglei: Conceptualization, Formal analysis, Data curation, Investigation, Methodology, Writing-original draft preparation; ZHANG Jianming: Supervision, Conceptualization, Methodology, Writing-review & editing, Funding acquisition; WEI Shoucai: Resources; SUN Zhizhong: Investigation; ZHANG Hu: Conceptualization, Methodology, Writing-review & editing, Funding acquisition.

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Correspondence to Hu Zhang.

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Wang, H., Zhang, J., Wei, S. et al. Experimental and numerical interpretation on composite foundation consisting of soil-cement column within warm and ice-rich frozen soil. J. Mt. Sci. 21, 313–321 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11629-023-8244-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11629-023-8244-x

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