TY - GEN
T1 - In Situ Seismic Investigations of Coal Tailings
AU - Liew, Min
AU - Xiao, Ming
N1 - Funding Information:
The authors are grateful for the financial support provided by the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement (OSMRE), U.S. Department of Interior. The authors thank the crew members from Vibra-Tech Engineers, Inc. for performing seismic survey. The authors also thank Behnoud Kermani and Jintai Wang for help in the seismic survey.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2019 American Society of Civil Engineers.
PY - 2019
Y1 - 2019
N2 - Catastrophic tailings dam failures have resulted in significant social, economic, and environmental losses. The geotechnical properties of coal tailings have been investigated in the past using reconstituted samples or relatively undisturbed samples. To realistically assess the stability of coal tailings dams under dynamic loadings, there is a need to determine the in situ properties of coal tailings using non-destructive field testing. In this study, seismic refraction survey and multichannel analysis of surface waves method are performed in two coal tailings impoundments in the Appalachian coalfields in the USA. Shear wave and compressional wave velocities of coal tailings are determined based on the field data. Young's modulus, shear modulus, and Poisson's ratio that are critical in understanding the stress-strain relationship of coal tailings are estimated. The Poisson's ratio of the unsaturated fine coal tailings is determined to be 0.39. The Young's modulus of the soft fine coal tailings for the inactive site is higher than that for the active site (i.e., 65 MPa versus 35 MPa). The small-strain shear modulus of the fine coal tailings is determined to be in the range of 10 to 50 MPa. The parameters derived from these seismic investigations contribute to the scarce database of geotechnical properties of coal tailings and can be applied to future stability assessment of coal tailings dams.
AB - Catastrophic tailings dam failures have resulted in significant social, economic, and environmental losses. The geotechnical properties of coal tailings have been investigated in the past using reconstituted samples or relatively undisturbed samples. To realistically assess the stability of coal tailings dams under dynamic loadings, there is a need to determine the in situ properties of coal tailings using non-destructive field testing. In this study, seismic refraction survey and multichannel analysis of surface waves method are performed in two coal tailings impoundments in the Appalachian coalfields in the USA. Shear wave and compressional wave velocities of coal tailings are determined based on the field data. Young's modulus, shear modulus, and Poisson's ratio that are critical in understanding the stress-strain relationship of coal tailings are estimated. The Poisson's ratio of the unsaturated fine coal tailings is determined to be 0.39. The Young's modulus of the soft fine coal tailings for the inactive site is higher than that for the active site (i.e., 65 MPa versus 35 MPa). The small-strain shear modulus of the fine coal tailings is determined to be in the range of 10 to 50 MPa. The parameters derived from these seismic investigations contribute to the scarce database of geotechnical properties of coal tailings and can be applied to future stability assessment of coal tailings dams.
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U2 - 10.1061/9780784482131.025
DO - 10.1061/9780784482131.025
M3 - Conference contribution
AN - SCOPUS:85063534922
SN - 9780784482131
T3 - Geotechnical Special Publication
SP - 239
EP - 247
BT - Geotechnical Special Publication
A2 - Meehan, Christopher L.
A2 - Kumar, Sanjeev
A2 - Pando, Miguel A.
A2 - Coe, Joseph T.
PB - American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE)
T2 - 8th International Conference on Case Histories in Geotechnical Engineering: Engineering Geology, Site Characterization, and Geophysics, Geo-Congress 2019
Y2 - 24 March 2019 through 27 March 2019
ER -