Studying the Effect of Scale of Fluctuation on the Flow Through an Earth Dam Using Stochastic Finite Element

Abstract

Estimation of quantity of flow through earth dams by using finite elements method mainly depends on the magnitudes of permeability for the earth dam.  The permeability of soil medium may be included in the solution as constant permeability or non homogeneous, anisotropic or may be distributed as random field.   Simulation of properties of soil by using random fields’ generators has great interest nowadays.  This paper includes studying of the effect of anisotropy of scale of fluctuation of the permeability through the stochastic finite elements analysis for case of flow through earth dam.  Permeability has been simulated by random field and mapped into finite element methods according to the most recent studies.  The results have shown that (1) quantity of seepage through stochastic earth dam is always less than that calculated for deterministic state.  (2)  As horizontal to vertical scale of fluctuation (anisotropy of scale of fluctuation) increases, quantity of seepage increases but it still less than that for deterministic state.   The seepage elevation is also reduced at random field state compared to deterministic solution.