Active control of underground stresses through rock pressurization

Details

• Personal Author:
  Vandergrift, Thomas L.
• Corporate Authors:
  United States. Bureau of Mines
• Description:
  "To significantly increase the stability of underground excavations while exploiting the full advantages of confined rock strength, methods must be developed to actively control the distribution of stresses near the excavation. The U.S. Bureau of Mines study examines theoretical and practical aspects of rock pressurization, an active stress control concept that induces compressive stress in the wall rock through repeated hydraulic fracturing with a settable fluid. Numerical analyses performed by incorporating the rock pressurization concept into a variety of boundary-element models indicate that rock pressurization has the potential to improve underground excavation stability in three ways: (1) by relocating stress concentrations away from the weak opening surface to stronger, confined wall rock
  
  (2) by inducing additional stresses in a biaxial stress field to reduce the difference between the principal stress components near the surface of the opening
  
  and (3) by counteracting the tensile stresses induced in the rock around internally loaded openings." - NIOSHTIC-2
  
  NIOSH no. 20039363
  
  
• Subjects:
  Occupational Health Safety
• Series:
  NIOSH Numbered Publications
• Subseries:
  Report of Investigations
• Document Type:
  Text
• Genre:
  Report
• CIO:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
• Topic:
  Workplace Safety & Health
• Location:
  North America
• Pages in Document:
  49 numbered pages
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:20039363
• Collection(s):
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:c493f76b86efd5977d74b20df54b0f61028d32376a28684a70e6c85b8664b16f6821bc00f8dc20838c5f2cdd764c69f7afb354aceef25315766b29498cc5458c
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/10051/cdc_10051_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 5.44 MB ]