Journal of Cold Regions Engineering

An experimental village at Kilpisjärvi in the northwest corner of Finland has been built to test state‐of‐the‐art materials and design techniques for cold regions construction. The Technical Research Center of Finland is conducting several diversified research projects at this site, which is characteristic of relatively remote subarctic conditions in Europe. Experiments and studies include evaluation of building‐foundation designs, cold weather concreting, housing design, vapor‐barrier tests, costs of construction in remote regions, road‐embankment materials and design, permafrost stabilization under roads and aufeis‐mitigation designs. Many of the experiments are in progress, and results have not yet been published or are published in Finnish. However, the variety of tests and the preliminary results promise a great deal of information over the next few years. In particular, the ability to successfully place concrete when air temperatures are $-29°C$ $(-11°F)$ promises to advance the state of the art in this field, and the field trials of several innovative housing‐design features will be of interest to builders and designers of cold‐regions structures.

A probabilistic model has been developed for the selection of a design iceberg collision with an offshore structure. The design event is selected on the basis of global sliding force, which is likely to determine whether or not structural failure will occur during an iceberg collision. Hydrodynamic effects, including iceberg added mass, wave‐induced oscillatory iceberg motions, and the modification of currents by the presence of a structure, are considered in the evaluation of iceberg velocity and location of impact against a structure. A time‐stepping model is subsequently used for evaluating forces induced by ice crushing and friction during a collision. The application of the model to the selection of a design iceberg collision event is illustrated through two examples. Among the various parameters influencing collision severity, it appears that eccentricity of impact has a relatively small influence on design load levels. Wave‐induced oscillatory motions are shown to be significant for small icebergs.

Recently published research has proven the feasibility of the theory of using geosynthetic materials to reinforce unpaved roadways over thermokarst terrain that includes complete voids. The research developed the theory to design geosynthetic bridges, and full‐scale tests substantiated the theory. The present study consists of four additional field‐test sections studied over a period of two summers. As in the previous tests, the tests consisted of making a trench, placing a geosynthetic across it, and constructing a roadway section over the trench and geosynthetic. The trenches were wider than in previous tests; some of the trenches extended diagonally across the road and some of the test sections were paved. From these tests, criteria were developed to design paved roads over thermokarst terrain.