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State Key Laboratory of Hydroscience and Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China
State Key Laboratory of Simulation and Regulation of Water Cycle in River Basin, China Institute of Water Resources and Hydropower Research, Beijing 100048, China
a r t i c l e
i n f o
Article history:
Received 2 January 2013
Received in revised form 15 February 2013
Accepted 21 February 2013
Available online 30 March 2013
Keywords:
Monte Carlo method
Numerical integration
Seepage
Finite element method (FEM)
Free surface
a b s t r a c t
In this paper, The Monte Carlo method is incorporated into the nite element method (FEM) to conduct
seepage analysis with a free surface. For the transitional element cut by the free surface, it is used to calculate the composite permeability coefcient, as well as to perform the integration directly using Monte
Carlo integration. This new algorithm requires less iteration procedures for convergence. The convergence of the method is also proved for cases where there is a signicant difference between the permeability coefcient above and below the free surface.
2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
1. Introduction
One of the major difculties in FEM-based seepage analysis of
levees and dams is that the free surface is not known a priori. In
general, two approaches have been developed to deal with such
problems. One assumes a free surface initially and adjusts it iteratively, resulting in a moving-mesh procedure that continues until
the boundary conditions are sufciently satised on the free surface [1]. The other is a xed mesh method in which the nite element meshes are xed during the iterations. For example, Desai
presented residual ow schemes [2,3], while Bathe and Khoshgoftaar [4] proposed a model considering meshes on the free surface
to be composed of composite materials. Saturated and unsaturated
theory can also be used to solve this problem with a xed mesh, in
which the zero pressure contour serves as the free surface [5,6].
There are many other techniques that are also used to solve these
problems, such as the variational inequality method, the numerical
manifold method, the boundary-tted coordinate transformation
method, the nite-volume method, and the meshless method [7
11].
The xed mesh nite element method is more convenient when
the seepage problem is coupled with stressstrain analysis, e.g., in
consolidation analysis with a free surface. In the method proposed
by Bathe and Khoshgoftaar [4], the composite permeability coefcient of the transitional element cut by the free surface is deter Corresponding author. Tel.: +86 10 68785126.
E-mail address: dgang@iwhr.com (G. Deng).
0266-352X/$ - see front matter 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.compgeo.2013.02.005
mined by the ratio between the parts above and below the free
surface. For solving the problem with saturated and unsaturated
theory, there is also a marked difference in the permeability between the upper and lower parts of the transitional element. In
fact, Bathe and Khoshgoftaars method can be considered as a special case of saturated and unsaturated theory. The method for estimating the composite permeability correctly is crucial in the
numerical analysis. If the permeability coefcient is not suitably
calculated, iterations may fail leading to a wrong result being
obtained.
In this paper, we deal with the problem through integrating the
Monte Carlo method with nite element analysis. This proposed
method can be used to calculate the composite permeability coefcient of the transitional element cut by the free surface, or to do
the integration directly by Monte Carlo integration. A program
written by the authors was used to analyze several seepage problems with a free surface, and the computational examples show
that this method improves the convergence rate greatly and simplies the program.
The Monte Carlo method provides a simple approach to conducting numerical integration called Monte Carlo integration. For
the integration
f xdx;
^I b a f x1 f xn :
n
@
@h
@
@h
@
@h
kx
ky
kz
0;
@x
@x
@y
@y
@z
@z
Kfhg fQg;
g 1; p P 0;
g 1=1000; p < 0;
n1 k n2 k ;
k
1
2
n
n
k
k
k
p
Free surface
Free surface
V1
V2
Free surface
(b) Scheme 1
to show good convergence characteristics. The free surface obtained by Scheme 3 is shown in Fig. 9.
4. Unsaturated unsteady seepage
For unsaturated seepage, the zero pressure contour serves as
the free surface. The permeability coefcient is a function of pore
water pressure (see Fig. 10). In fact, the curve of k vs. p in Fig. 1
can be considered to be a special case for unsaturated soil.
The differential equation governing unsaturated unsteady
water ow is
@
@h
@
@h
@
@h
@nSr
kx
ky
kz
;
@x
@x
@y
@y
@z
@z
@t
p
Fig. 10. Permeability coefcient vs. pore water pressure for unsaturated soil.
The initial water level on the left side was 0.1 m, and it reached
0.3 m instantaneously during the test. The water level on the right
side was kept at 0.1 m throughout. The computed results are presented in Fig. 12, in which the curves are the free surfaces calculated at t = 30 s, 60 s, 120 s, 240 s, 600 s and 4800 s after the
water level reaches 0.3 m. Comparing the test results indicates that
the Monte Carlo method performs well for analyzing unsaturated
and unsteady seepage. Not surprisingly, a similar application is
to conduct consolidation analysis of unsaturated soil. In fact, the
numerical simulation of water-lling in an earth-rock dam reported in Ref. [27] has actually employed the Monte Carlo method
to deal with the transitional element.
5. Conclusions
The Monte Carlo method is used in this paper to improve the
convergence of seepage analysis. It is effective for regions where
permeability varies greatly on some transitional elements that
are cut by the free surface.
Fig. 11. Finite element mesh for the sand box model test (in m).
Table 1
Degree of saturation Sr and relative permeability coefcient kr of the sand.
Pore water pressure, p
(kPa)
Degree of
saturation, Sr
Relative permeability
coefcient, kr
0
0.325
0.65
0.91
1.0
10.0
1
0.82
0.64
0.50
0.45
0.18
1
0.97
0.94
0.20
0.13
0.01
Tested
Calculated
4800s
600s
240s
120s
30s
60s
Acknowledgments
The supports of Natural Science Foundation of China
(51039003), National Basic Research Program of China (973 Program 2013CB036402) and the State Key Laboratory of Hydroscience and Engineering (2013-KY-4) are gratefully acknowledged.
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