Analysis of the Deformation of Embankments on the Qinghai-Tibet Railway
Publication: Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering
Volume 134, Issue 11
Abstract
Temperature changes and deformations were monitored on various embankment types on the Qinghai-Tibet Railway. Some of these embankments utilized permafrost protection techniques such as duct ventilation, crushed-rock embankments, crushed-rock protected slopes, or thermal-insulation treatments. Some embankments were built conventionally without considering permafrost protection. It was found that the majority of the deformations on both the permafrost-protected and the conventionally built embankments were due to deformation of warm frozen layers closely related to the temperature changes in the underlying permafrost. However, it was found that building embankments with permafrost protection reduced the magnitude of the settlements. After , deformation of all the embankments with permafrost protection countermeasures became smaller and smaller, whereas deformation was still increasing in the conventional embankments, where the settlement in the underlying permafrost could reach a considerable level, and could be a potential trigger for embankment failure. This should be taken into consideration in the railway engineering project on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau.
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Acknowledgments
This work was in part supported by the grant of the Western Project Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (KZCX2–XB2–10), the Hundred Young Talents program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Key Project of the Chinese National Natural Science Foundation (50534040). The writers thank Mr. Guangli Feng for his help with the field work and are indebted to the editor and anonymous reviewers for their hard work in improving the paper.
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering
Volume 134 • Issue 11 • November 2008
Pages: 1645 - 1654
Copyright
© 2008 ASCE.
History
Received: Jul 25, 2007
Accepted: Mar 24, 2008
Published online: Nov 1, 2008
Published in print: Nov 2008
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