Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Moisture Movement Through Cracked Clay Soil Profiles

  • Original paper
  • Published:
Geotechnical and Geological Engineering Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

A continuum mechanics approach is used for the formulation of unsaturated hydraulic conductivity functions and the water storage functions for fractured or cracked clay soils in this parametric study. Suggested procedures are based on available research literature related to the behavior of cracked unsaturated porous media. The soil–water characteristic curve, hydraulic conductivity and water storage functions take on the character of bi-modal unsaturated soil property functions. The bimodal character arises out of the independent behavior of the cracks and the intact clay soil. Matric suction changes beneath a slab-on-grade foundation placed on a cracked clay soil profile are modeled for varied surface flux conditions using the proposed unsaturated hydraulic conductivity and water storage functions. The impact of various levels of surface cracking on soil suction distributions is discussed. Suction distribution patterns are dependent on the initial soil surface suction. In particular, the results are dependent upon whether the initial matric suction is less than or greater than the air entry of the cracked clay. There is an extremely wide range of possible conditions that could be modeled but the parametric study results presented in this paper are limited to a series of selected crack widths and densities for an exfiltration case and an infiltration case.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5
Fig. 6
Fig. 7
Fig. 8
Fig. 9
Fig. 10
Fig. 11
Fig. 12
Fig. 13
Fig. 14
Fig. 15
Fig. 16
Fig. 17
Fig. 18
Fig. 19
Fig. 20
Fig. 21
Fig. 22
Fig. 23
Fig. 24
Fig. 25
Fig. 26
Fig. 27
Fig. 28
Fig. 29
Fig. 30
Fig. 31
Fig. 32

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Assouline S (2001) A model for soil relative hydraulic conductivity based on the water retention characteristic curve. Water Resour Res 37:265–271

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Barenblatt GI, Zheltov IP, Kochina IN (1960) Basic concepts in the theory of seepage of homogeneous liquids in fissured rocks. J Appl Math 24:1286–1303

    Google Scholar 

  • Berkowitz B (2002) Characterizing flow and transport in fractured geological media: a review. Adv Water Resour 25:861–884

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Brooks RH, Corey AT (1964) Hydraulic properties of porous media. Colorado State University Hydrology Paper, Fort Collins, Nr. 3, vol. 27, March

  • Burdine NT (1953) Relative permeability calculation size distribution data. Transactions of the American Institute of Mining. Metallur Petrol Eng 198:71–78

    Google Scholar 

  • Burger CA, Shackelford CD (2001) Soil-water characteristic curves and dual porosity of sand-diatomaceous earth mixtures. J Geotech Geoenviron Eng ASCE 127(9):790–800

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Campbell JD (1973) Pore pressures and volume changes in unsaturated soils. Ph.D. thesis, University of Illinois at Urbana, Champaign, Urbana-Champaign, IL, USA

  • Carman PC (1939) Permeability of saturated sands, soils and clays. J Agric Sci 29:262–273

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Chertkov VY, Ravina I (2000) Shrinking-swelling phenomenon of clay soils attributed to capillary-crack network. Theor Appl Fract Mech 34:61–71

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Durner W (1994) Hydraulic conductivity estimation for soil with heterogeneous pore structure. Water Resour Res 30(2):211–223

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fredlund MD (1996) SoilVision users guide, Version 2.0, Edition 1.0. SoilVision Systems Ltd, Saskatoon

    Google Scholar 

  • Fredlund DG, Rahardjo H (1993) Soil mechanics for unsaturated soils. Wiley, New York

    Google Scholar 

  • Fredlund DG, Xing A (1994) Equations for the soil-water characteristic curve. Can Geotech J 31:521–532

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gardner WR (1958) Some steady-state solutions of unsaturated moisture flow equations with application to evaporation from a water table. Soil Sci 85:228–232

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gitirana G Jr, Fredlund DG (2004) Equations for the soil-water characteristic curve based on meaningful and mathematically independent parameters, technical note. ASCE J Geotech Environ Eng 130(2):209–212

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Irmay S (1954) On the hydraulic conductivity of unsaturated soils. Transactions of the American Geophysical Union, vol 35

  • Irmay S (1971) A model of flow of liquid-gas mixtures in porous media and hysteresis of capillary potential. Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa

    Google Scholar 

  • Kazemi H (1969) Pressure transient analysis of naturally fractured reservoirs with uniform fracture distribution. Soc Petrol Eng J 451–62. Trans AIME 246

  • Kazemi H (1979) Numerical simulation of water imbibition in fractured cores. Soc Petrol Eng J 323–330

  • Keller CK, van der Kamp G, Cherry JA (1985) Fracture permeability and groundwater flow in clayey till near Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. Can Geotech J 23:229–240

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Köhne JM, Köhne S, Gerke HH (2002) Estimating the hydraulic functions of dual-permeability models from bulk soil data. Water Resour Res 38(7):1121–1132

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kozeny J (1927) Ueber Kapillare Leitung des Wassers im Boden. Wien AkadWiss 136(2a):271

    Google Scholar 

  • Kunze RJ, Uehara G, Graham K (1968) Factors important in the calculation of hydraulic conductivity. Soil Sci Soc Am Proc 32:760–765

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Leong EC, Rahardjo H (1997) Review of soil-water characteristic curve equations. J Geotech Eng Div ASCE 123(12):1106–1117

    Google Scholar 

  • Liu HH, Bodvarsson GS (2001) Constitutive relations for unsaturated flow in a fracture network. J Hydrol 252:16–25

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Liu HH, Bodvarsson GS, Finsterle S (2004) A note on unsaturated flow in two-dimensional fracture networks. Technical note. Earth Sciences Division. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. University of California, Berkeley California

  • Mallant D, Tseng PH, Torde N, Timmerman A, Feyen J (1997) Evaluation of multimodal hydraulic function in charactering a heterogeneous field soil. J Hydrol 195:172–199

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Mualem Y (1976) A new model for predicting the hydraulic conductivity of unsaturated porous media. Water Resour Res 12:593–622

    Google Scholar 

  • Novák V, Simunek J, van Genuchten MTh (2000) Infiltration into soil with fractures. J Irrig Drain Eng 126(1):41–47

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Odeh AS (1965) Unsteady-state behavior of naturally fractured reservoirs. J Soc Petrol Eng 3:60–64

    Google Scholar 

  • Peters RR, Klavetter EA (1988) A continuum model for water movement in unsaturated fractured rock mass. Water Resour Res 24(3):416–430

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Pruess K, Narasimhan TN (1985) A practical method for modeling fluid and heat flow in fractured porous media. Soc Petrol Eng J 25:14–26

    Google Scholar 

  • Sillers WS, Fredlund DG, Zakerzadeh N (2002) Mathematical attributes of some soil-water characteristics curve models. Geotech Geol Eng J 19:243–283

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Snow DT (1965) A parallel plate model of fractured permeable media, Ph.D. dissertation, University of California, Berkeley, 331 p

  • Stothoff S, Or D (2000) A discrete-fracture boundary integral approach to simulating coupled energy and moisture transport in a fractured porous medium. In: Faybishenko B, Witherspoon PA, Benson SM (eds) Dynamics of fluids in fractured rocks, concepts, and recet advances. AGU Geophysical Monograph 122

  • van Genuchten M Th (1980) A closed form equation for predicting the hydraulic conductivity of unsaturated soils. Soil Sci Soc Am J 44:892–898

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Warren JE, Root PJ (1963) The behavivor of naturally fractured reservoirs. Soc Petrol Eng J 245–255. Trans AIME 228

  • Wu TH (1976) Soil mechanics, 2nd edn. Allyn asnd Bacon, Boston

    Google Scholar 

  • Wu YS (2000) On the effective continuum method for modeling multiphase flow, multi-component transport and heat transfer in fractured rock. In: Faybishenko B, Witherspoon PA, Benson SM (eds) Dynamics of fluids in fractured rocks, concepts, and recent advances. AGU Geophysical Monograph 122

  • Wu YS, Pruess K (2005) A physically based numerical approach for modeling fracture-matrix interaction in fractured reservoirs. In; Proceedings world geothermal congress 2005, Antalya, Turkey, 24–29 April 2005, pp 1–8

  • Wu YS, Haukwa C, Bodvarsson GS (1999) A site-scale mmodel for fluid and heat flow in the unsaturated zone of Yucca Mountain, Nevada. J Contam Hydrol 38(1–3):185–217

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Zhang L, Fredlund DG (2004) Characteristics of water characteristic curves for unsaturated fractured rocks. In: The second Asian conference on unsaturated soils, Unsat-Asia, Osaka, Japan, pp 425–428

Download references

Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the Homebuilders’ Association of Central Arizona, and in part by NSF under grant no. CMMI-0825089. The views presented in this paper are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the Homebuilders’ Association of Central Arizona.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Golder Associates, Saskatoon, SK, S7H 0T4, Canada

    Delwyn G. Fredlund

  2. Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, USA

    Sandra L. Houston

  3. Golder Associates Pty Ltd, Brisbane, Australia

    Quan Nguyen

  4. SoilVision Systems Ltd, Saskatoon, SK, S7N 1A9, Canada

    Murray D. Fredlund

Authors
  1. Delwyn G. Fredlund
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Sandra L. Houston
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Quan Nguyen
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Murray D. Fredlund
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Sandra L. Houston.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Fredlund, D.G., Houston, S.L., Nguyen, Q. et al. Moisture Movement Through Cracked Clay Soil Profiles. Geotech Geol Eng 28, 865–888 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10706-010-9349-x

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10706-010-9349-x

Keywords

Search

Navigation