Development technology of rigidity-drain pile and numerical analysis of its anti-liquefaction characteristics

Pile foundation is widely used in the offshore engineering. The pile can be seriously destroyed by the soil liquefaction during strong earthquakes. The potentials of liquefaction and damages of pile foundation due to the liquefaction can be reduced by the implementation of the drainage in the liquefiable foundation. A patented pile technology, named rigidity-drain pile, was introduced. The partial section of the pile body was filled by materials with higher penetrability which forms some effective drainage channels in the pile. The principles and construction methods were presented. 3D models for both rigidity-drain pile and ordinary pile were built in FLAC3D code. The dynamic loadings were applied on the bottom of the model. According to the numerical results, in the case of the rigidity-drain pile, the water in the relevant distance range around the pile flows toward the pile drainage, the contour of the pore pressure shows a funnel form. Contrast to the ordinary pile, the rigidity-drain pile can dissipate the accumulated excess pore water, maintain effective stress and obviously reduce the possibility of surrounding soil liquefaction.

Numerical computation of anti-liquefaction effect of lattice-type cement-mixed soil countermeasure

Continuous soil-cement wall confinement method to resist liquefaction is a new kind of process. However, whether it also has a good effect on anti-liquefaction or not needs to be urgently answered for earthquake engineering. Quiet boundary is adopted on the lateral face while free field boundary is employed at the bottom. Byrne model on dynamic pore water pressure generation is accepted and natural seismic wave EI Centro whose peak acceleration is adjusted to 0.2 g in proportion is used for input. A double-layer foundation with sandy soil in the upper portion while clay soil in the lower part is chosen as the calculation model, which is 30 m in length and 20 m in width. The groundwater level is on the ground surface. Excess pore water pressure rate is considered as a liquefaction index in the three-dimensional non-linear earthquake response computation. The anti-liquefaction effectiveness and its influencing factors, such as confinement element area are studied. For the natural double-layer foundation, it is liquefied when the excess pore water pressure rate reaches 1.0 under the seismic load. Under the same earthquake load, the peak excess pore water pressure reduces to 0.56 after adopting reinforcement of the continuous soil-cement wall, which is 46% lower than before. It indicates that continuous soil-cement wall confinement method can attain the purpose of anti-liquefaction. Accordingly, it can be a sort of engineering measure to carry on the anti-liquefaction foundation treatment.

Wave effects on the anti-liquefaction of the seabed around composite bucket foundation of offshore wind turbines

By using the open-source software OpenFOAM and the grid generation tool the integrated computer engineering and manufacturing code for computational fluid dynamics(ICEM CFD),a computational fluid dynamics-computational structural dynamics(CFD-CSD)coupling model is established.The dynamic response and the liquefaction of the seabed around the composite bucket foundation of the offshore wind turbines in the Xiangshui area of Jiangsu Province are investigated.The pore water pressure,the effective stress,the liquefaction depth and the anti-liquefaction effect of the overlying stones are analyzed.It is shown that the seabed around the composite bucket foundation will be liquefied under 50 year return waves,the liquefaction width is approximately 1/3 of the wavelength,and the maximum liquefaction depth is approximately 1/4 of the wave height.In addition,the overlying stones provide an effective anti-liquefaction method.Thicker,less porous overlying stones have a better anti-liquefaction effect.

Seismic Response of Offshore Wind Structure Supported by Bucket Foundation

An integrated finite element model(FEM)of offshore wind tower-foundation-soil is established by ABAQUS, where a large-scale composite bucket foundation with seven compartments inside is applied to supporting the upper wind tower. The dynamic response of the structure-foundation system is studied under three seismic waves with the same peak ground acceleration of 0.035 g. It can be seen that the dynamic response increases at the beginning with the structure height, then it decreases because the structural damping increases due to the mass effect of the upper wind turbine generator system. It is shown that the anti-liquefaction capacity of the soil inside and underneath the foundation is improved owing to the high overburden pressure of the upper structure and the constraint effect of the bucket skirt and subdivisions. Moreover, the liquefaction resistance of the soil inside the middle compartment is improved to a higher degree than that inside the side compartments.