Abstract:

Electroosmosis consolidation provides a potentially attractive soil improvement technique, which involves the application of a direct current potential across electrodes embedded in the soil and cause the flow of pore water from the anode toward the cathode. The traditional electroosmosis theory cannot provide satisfied solution due to the hypothesis of constant parameters of mechanical and electrical properties of soils. In this paper, FEM software is developed to couple the Laplace equation for electrical field with Biot’s equation for consolidation; and the displacement of soil mass and pore water pressure can be obtained during electroosmosis process. The nonlinear relationship among electrical resistivity, void ratio and effective stress is incorporated in the control equations. The calculation results of both one and two dimensional model agree well with the analytical solutions. The software can simulate complicated boundary conditions and predict the settlement process of the soil layers. Furthermore, the software can provide useful data for system design of electroosmosis treatment technique.

Key words: electroosmosis, consolidation, finite elements, soft clay