Model for estimation of stress field in the earth's crust

Abstract

Stress field or in-situ stress, beside rock mass strength, determines stability or instability of underground openings. It plays key role of every rock engineering project, and has been subject of many researches. There are many theoretical models of the stress field of the Earth's crust which have more or less limited domain of applicability. However, those models usually express horizontal stresses as ratio with vertical stress component. On the other side, it is well known that deformation modulus of the rock mass is dependent on the lateral stress it is subjected to. This dependence is, herein, coupled with practical findings of the stress field behavior and incorporated into the stress filed model. As the result new formulation for the stress filed components is obtained.

Keywords

• field stress
• rock mass
• underground excavation