Numerical Analysis of Frost Heave and Thaw Settlement for Pipeline Buried in Frost-Susceptible Soil via Thermosiphons

Abstract

Seasonal frost or permafrost soils may encounter frost heave or thaw settlement resulting from atmospheric temperature changes and/or heat emanating from the resource-carrying pipeline. Notably, these soil movements can damage the pipeline. Thus, various ground stabilization methods have been developed to prevent the onset of these phenomena in frost-susceptible soils, and the application of thermosiphons is a representative method. Recently, a numerical analysis method called the thermosiphon model for a pipeline and thermosiphons in frost-susceptible soil has been developed; however, the study only focused on the ability to reduce frost heave of the soil using the thermosiphon. Therefore, here, numerical analysis was conducted to determine the performance of a buried pipeline according to frost heave and thaw settlement by applying the thermosiphon model via ABAQUS. For the novel numerical analysis, two scenarios are established: frost heave and thaw settlement. For each scenario, the behaviors of the frost-susceptible soil and pipeline are compared in four cases, distinguished by the arrangement of thermosiphons applied. The results indicate that according to the arrangement of the thermosiphons, the frost-heave and thaw-settlement behaviors are verifiably reduced by up to 62% and 82%, respectively, compared to when no thermosiphons are applied.

Keywords

• frost heave
• thaw settlement
• frost-susceptible soil
• thermosiphon
• finite element analysis