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A.C. Dieudonne
ArGEnCo Department, University of Liege, Liege, Belgium
F.R.I.A., Fond de la Recherche Scientifique - FNRS, Brussels, Belgium
R. Charlier, S. Levasseur
ArGEnCo Department, University of Liege, Liege, Belgium
G. Della Vecchia
Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Politecnico di Milano, Milano, Italy
C. Jommi
Department of Geosciences and Engineering, TU Delft, Delft, The Netherlands
ABSTRACT: The paper presents a water retention model for compacted clayey soils. The model is based
on a description of the aggregated structure of the material and its evolution along generalized hydraulic and
mechanical stress paths. The water retention properties of each structural level are distinguished and described
separately using an expression of the type proposed by van Genuchten (1980). The water retention model is val-
idated against experimental data on Boom Clay compacted at different dry densities. Its qualitative performance
are highlighted along a complex hydromechanical path. The proposed formulation succeeds in tracking simul-
taneously the evolution of the fabric pattern and of the hydraulic state of compacted clays along generalized
stress paths.
1 INTRODUCTION stitial fluid (Musso et al. 2013) and the particular hy-
dromechanical path followed during compaction (De-
Compacted clays are used in a wide range of geotech- lage 2010). In addition, the structure is not fixed but
nical and geo-environmental applications. In civil en- evolves along with mechanical, hydraulic or chem-
gineering, compacted clayey soils are found in em- ical loading (see for instance Romero et al. 1999,
bankments and earth dams, whereas they are consid- Cuisinier and Laloui 2004, Della Vecchia 2009, Mon-
ered as engineered barriers for the disposal of domes- roy et al. 2010, Romero et al. 2011, Casini et al. 2012,
tic, industrial and hazardous waste. In these applica- Wang et al. 2013).
tions, the compacted material remains essentially un-
saturated over its service life. The characterization of In the last years, increasing attention has been
its water retention properties is thus fundamental to paid to the links between the water retention prop-
a comprehensive understanding and modelling of the erties of a soil and its evolving pore size distribu-
coupled response of the material in terms of water tion (PSD). Durner (1994) modelled successfully the
flow and deformation processes. water retention behaviour of a sandy loam, distin-
Since many years, numerous studies have recog- guishing explicitly in the formulation the existence
nised the importance of the material structure on the of two structural levels. The same approach was later
engineered properties of compacted clayey soils (see used by Gitirana Jr. and Fredlund (2004) on a pel-
Romero 2013 for a review). While compacted on letized diatomaceous soil and on a residual, highly
the dry side of optimum, clayey soils exhibit a typ- collapsible clay from Brasilia. Romero and Vaunat
ical aggregated fabric. This fabric is not unique and (2000) distinguished an intra-aggregate water region
the size of the aggregates appears to be sensitive and inter-aggregate water region to model the reten-
to the compaction water content (Thom et al. 2007, tion behaviour of Boom Clay. However none of these
Birle 2012), the chemical composition of the inter- Authors have considered explicitly the evolutionary
0.8
character of the material structure along hydrome-
(M)
Calibrated values
(m)
0
Least-squares exponential fitting 10
1 s(m)
0 = 180 exp(-9 em) [MPa]
10
R2 = 0.89
Boom Clay
-2
10
0 Calibrated values
10
Least-squares exponential fitting
s(M)
0 = 1.5 exp(-5 eM/e) [MPa]
R2 = 0.75
-4
10
-1 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8
10
0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 Macrostructural void ratio over total void ratio, eM/e [-]
Microstructural void ratio, em [-]
(b) Dependence of the macrostructural air-entry pressure
(a) Dependence of the microstructural air-entry pressure with the ratio of the macrostructural void ratio over the total
with the microstructural void ratio. void ratio.
Figure 2: Variation of the model parameters along hydromechanical stress paths.
1
Clay from Romero et al. (2011). The model parame- Experimental data
(Romero et al., 2011)
0.9
ters were first determined by calibrating the pore size Axis translation (e = 0.93)
0.8 Axis translation (e = 0.65)
distribution model against experimental PSD curves Vapour equilibrium (e = 0.93)
from Della Vecchia (2009). In total, 18 experimental Water ratio, ew [-] 0.7 Vapour equilibrium (e = 0.65)
SMI psychrometer (e = 0.5 - 0.82)
PSD curves were fitted with equation (3) in a system- 0.6 WPA psychrometer (e = 0.93 - 0.99)
atic way in order to highlight the influence of various 0.5 Model (e = 0.93)
Model (e = 0.65)
hydromechanical stress paths, such as wetting, drying 0.4
and loading. Details concerning the calibration pro- 0.3
cess have been presented in Dieudonne et al. (2013). 0.2
In accordance with the calibration of the pore size 0.1
distribution model, the parameters n(m) , m(m) , n(M ) 0 -2 -1 0 1 2 3
and m(M ) are set constant. All parameter values are 10 10 10 10
Suction, s [MPa]
10 10
presented in Table 1. Regarding the evolution of the Figure 4: Comparison between experimental main
microstructural void ratio with the water content, the drying paths for compacted Boom Clay (Romero et al.
following parameters are used: β0 = 0.2, β1 = 0.05 2011) and model predictions at different void ratios.
and em,0 = 0.33.
The performance of the model is presented in Fig- the contrary, for low values of suction, the water re-
ure 4. It can be observed that the model predictions tention curve is sensitive to mechanical actions. Be-
compare favourably with the experimental data on ing calibrated on a huge number of hydromechanical
Boom clay compacted at different void ratios (e = paths, the model can be fruitfully used to predict the
0.65 and e = 0.93). The model succeeds in tracking hydraulic response of the material along different hy-
the increase of air entry pressure with decreasing void dromechanical paths.
ratio. Moreover, for high suction values, the model
tends to reach a unique relationship between water ra-
tio and suction, regardless the current value of void 4 ILLUSTRATIVE EXAMPLE
ratio. In this domain, the water retention is indeed
dominated by the behaviour of the microstructure. On The qualitative response of the water retention model
is evaluated along a complex loading wetting unload-
ing path. The mechanical behaviour of the material is
modelled using the Barcelona Basic Model (Alonso
et al. 1990) so that the total volumetric strain includes
two distinct contributions: a first contribution related
Table 1: Parameters of the water retention model for
Boom Clay.
Microstructural parameters Macrostructural parameters
n(m) 1.65 n(M ) 2.0
m(m) 0.35 m(M ) 0.16
(m) (M )
α1 180 MPa α1 1.5 MPa
(m) (M )
Figure 3: Predicted state surface in the (s-e-Sr ) space. α2 9.0 α2 5.0
to changes in the mean net stress pressure, and a sec- sion of the type proposed by van Genuchten (1980).
ond one associated to changes in suction. Using Washburn equation, a pore size density model
The parameters of Boom Clay have been used in is derived. Selected experimental data of pore size
the simulations. An initial void ratio of 0.97 and an distribution on compacted clays were analysed and
initial suction of 3 MPa are considered, leading to an reinterpreted in the eyes of the proposed formulation
initial degree of saturation equal to 0.55. An aggre- in order to calibrate the model. The water retention
gated structure is associated to this initial state of the model is then validated against experimental data on
material. It is depicted in Figure 5. the same materials compacted at different dry densi-
During a first stage (A), the material is loaded un- ties. The performances of the model are then high-
der oedometer conditions and constant water content lighted along a complex hydromechanical stress path
up to a vertical net stress of 2.5 MPa. During loading, along which the evolutions of the structure and of the
the material experiences a decrease in void ratio (Fig- water retention properties are analysed.
ure 6b). Figure 5 presents the evolution of the pore The proposed model captures important features of
size distribution of the material and shows that load- the retention behaviour of compacted clayey soils,
ing affects mainly the macrostructural pore volume such as the increase in microstructural porous vol-
while maintaining almost constant the volume of mi- ume with increasing water content, the increase in air-
cropores. In addition, the decrease of the porous space entry pressure for decreasing macrostructural voids
is associated with an increase in the degree of satura- and the existence, in the high suction range, of an
tion which is highlighted in Figure 6a. We observe intra-aggregate water region which is almost not sen-
that the reduction in void ratio causes a shifting of the sitive to the total void ratio.
water retention curve towards higher values of suction
for a given degree of saturation.
During a second loading stage, the material is satu- ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
rated under constant vertical stress (B). The decrease
in suction causes the material to swell, as shown in The authors acknowledge the Belgian FRS-FNRS for
Figure 6b. The saturation process induces an increase its financial support during the stay of the first Author
in the microstructural void ratio. Being under a rela- at the Politecnico di Milano.
tively high constant vertical stress, it is also associated
with a decrease in the macropores diameter (Figure REFERENCES
5). Consequently, the material structure changes from
an aggregated double structure to a monomodal pore Alonso, E., A. Gens, & A. Josa (1990). A constitutive model for
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Finally, the material is unloaded under constant Birle, E. (2012). Effect of initial water content and dry density on
water content (C). The unloading process leads to the pore structure and the soil-water retention curve of com-
pacted clay. In C. Mancuso, C. Jommi, and F. D’Onza (Eds.),
swelling of the material which affects mainly the Unsaturated Soils: Research and Applications, pp. 145–152.
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5 CONCLUSIONS Cuisinier, O. & L. Laloui (2004). Fabric evolution during hy-
dromechanical loading of a compacted silt. Int. J. Num. Anal.
The paper presents a water retention model for Meth. Geomech. 28, 483–499.
compacted clayey soils, accounting for the evolu- Delage, P. (2010). A microstructure approach to the sensitivity
and compressibility of some eastern canada sensitive clays.
tion of their aggregated structure along generalized Geotechnique 60, 353–368.
hydromechanical stress paths. Microstructural and Della Vecchia, G. (2009). Coupled hydro-mechanical behaviour
macrostructural water retention mechanisms are dis- of compacted clayey soils. Ph. D. thesis, Politecnico di Mi-
tinguished and described separately using an expres- lano.
Della Vecchia, G., C. Jommi, & E. Romero (2013). A fully cou-
0.5 pled elastic-plastic hydromechanical model for compacted
Pore size density function, de/d(log x)
0.5 0.86
10-2 10-1 100 101 10-2 10-1 100 101
Suction, s [MPa] Suction, s [MPa]
(a) Stress path in the (s, Sr ) plane (b) Stress path in the (s, e) plane
Figure 6: Evolution of the degree of saturation and the void ratio during a loading - saturation - unloading stress
path performed under oedometer conditions.