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Combined analysis of electrical resistivity and geotechnical SPT blow counts for the safety assessment of fill dam

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Environmental Geology

Abstract

Electrical resistivity survey and the geotechnical SPT blow counts (N value) method were simultaneously analyzed to investigate the stability of a center-core type earth-fill dam against the seepage phenomenon. The coupling of these heterogeneous field methods provided a chance to understand the status of underground material by comparing the geophysical and geotechnical view. The analysis shows that the zones with low resistivity value generally have low N value, which means low stiffness. However, some zones with a high resistivity pattern are not accompanied by an increase of its N value, and are even showing a lower N value. These results imply that one should be careful to directly correlate resistivity value with the real status of the core material of a fill dam. And a highly resistive zone may be in poor status due to the effect of increase of resistivity value as a result of the piping condition. Additional laboratory tests show that there is a deficiency of fine soil particles believed as the clay at the troubled region, which means an increase in resistivity value. Therefore, multiple explorations should be planned to reduce the uncertainty in application of geophysical methods to dam safety evaluation in order to compensate the resistivity information of core material.

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Acknowledgments

Suggestions and comments from Dr. Enzo Rizzo, an anonymous reviewer, and associate editor Dr. Mark Bultman helped us to improve the manuscript significantly. This work was supported by the Korea Research Foundation Grant funded by the Korean Government (MOEHRD, Basic Research Promotion Fund) (KRF-2006-003-D00709) and the research project (NP2007-015) of the Korea Institute of Geoscience and Mineral Resources (KIGAM) funded by the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Energy of Korea.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Geosystem Engineering, Kangwon National University, Hyoja 2-dong, Chuncheon, Kangwon, 200-701, South Korea

    Seokhoon Oh

  2. Earthquake Research Center, Korea Institute of Geoscience and Mineral Resources, 30, Gajeong-dong, Yuseong-gu, Daejeon, 305-350, South Korea

    Chang-Guk Sun

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  1. Seokhoon Oh
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  2. Chang-Guk Sun
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Correspondence to Seokhoon Oh.

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Oh, S., Sun, CG. Combined analysis of electrical resistivity and geotechnical SPT blow counts for the safety assessment of fill dam. Environ Geol 54, 31–42 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00254-007-0790-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00254-007-0790-y

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