Investigation of the spatial distribution of tunnel seepage under varying drainage capacities in water-abundant regions

Abstract

Effective control of the tunnel seepage field is crucial in water-abundant regions to ensure the safety and stability of underground structures. Therefore, it is imperative to investigate the effects of the geological factors and tunnel permeability parameters on the drainage capacities of such structures. The Tongzi Tunnel was subjected to model tests using a self-developed testing apparatus to investigate the spatial distribution of tunnel seepage under varying conditions of sand permeability, number of primary support layers, and number of primary support openings. Subsequently, numerical models were developed to validate the observed tunnel seepage field based on experimental conditions. On this basis, an effective water pressure ratio is proposed to evaluate the hydraulic safety of the tunnel spatial distribution. The results indicated a positive correlation between the tunnel water discharge and sand permeability, primary support layers, and primary support openings. Among these factors, the primary support openings exhibited the highest sensitivity to tunnel water discharge, whereas the impact of the primary support layers was relatively low. Additionally, the external water pressure in the tunnel exhibited a negative correlation with sand permeability, primary support layers, and primary support openings. The sensitivity ranking of the structural water pressure fluctuations to the parameters is as follows: primary support openings > sand permeability > primary support layers. Furthermore, the longitudinal water pressure values in the tunnel gradually increase from Section A (circular drainage section) to Section B (middle circular drainage section). Model tests and numerical simulations were performed to demonstrate the data reliability. Finally, with the increase of sand permeability and the number of primary support openings, the effective drainage area (η < 0.6) around the tunnel spatial gradually expands. Besides, the tunnel longitudinal effective drainage interval progressively degrades from the vault (A1 area) to the tunnel bottom (A7 area), and even the tunnel bottom areas are not effectively drained (η > 0.6).

Keywords

Tunnel seepage field / Model test / Numerical simulation / Tunnel drainage capacity / Effective water pressure ratio

Data availability

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

CRediT authorship contribution statement

Qing Xu: Writing - original draft, Software, Project administration, Methodology, Data curation. Pengfei Li: Writing - review & editing, Project administration, Funding acquisition. Chongbang Xu: Validation, Conceptualization. Siqing Wang: Methodology, Investigation, Data curation. Sulei Zhang: Supervision, Project administration.

Declaration of competing interest

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Acknowledgement

The authors gratefully acknowledge the financial support provided by the Natural Science Foundation of Beijing (Grant No. 8222004) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 52278383).

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