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Investigating the Roles of Included Angle and Loading Condition on the Critical Hydraulic Gradient of Real Rock Fracture Networks

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Abbreviations

Q :

Volumetric flow rate

w :

Width of a fracture

b h :

Hydraulic aperture

J :

Hydraulic gradient

J c :

Critical hydraulic gradient

P :

Hydraulic pressure

u :

Flow velocity vector

ρ :

Fluid density

E :

Nonlinear effect factor

T :

Transmissivity

T/T 0 :

Normalized transmissivity

x i :

X-coordinate of the fracture surface profile

z i :

Z-coordinate of the fracture surface profile

Z 2 :

Dimensionless roughness parameter

a :

Linear coefficient in the Forchheimer’s law

b :

Nonlinear coefficient in the Forchheimer’s law

l :

Fracture spacing

F x :

X-directional horizontal boundary load

F y :

Y-directional horizontal boundary load

σ fne :

Effective stress

µ :

Dynamic viscosity

β :

Included angle

λ :

Pressure ratio

α :

First regression coefficient

JRC:

Joint roughness coefficient

Re :

Reynolds number

Re c :

Critical Reynolds number

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Acknowledgements

The financial supports from the National Key Basic Research and Development Program of China, China (No. 2017YFC0603001), National Natural Science Foundation of China, China (Nos. 51734009, 51704279, 51709260), and Natural Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province, China (No. BK20170270) are gratefully acknowledged.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory for Geomechanics and Deep Underground Engineering, China University of Mining and Technology, Xuzhou, 221116, China

    Qian Yin, Hongwen Jing, Haijian Su & Richeng Liu

  2. College of Architecture and Civil Engineering, Beijing University of Technology, Beijing, 100124, China

    Guowei Ma

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  1. Qian Yin
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  2. Hongwen Jing
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  3. Guowei Ma
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  4. Haijian Su
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Correspondence to Richeng Liu.

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Yin, Q., Jing, H., Ma, G. et al. Investigating the Roles of Included Angle and Loading Condition on the Critical Hydraulic Gradient of Real Rock Fracture Networks. Rock Mech Rock Eng 51, 3167–3177 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00603-018-1526-x

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