Seismic performance based-design of large earth and tailing dams

The actual capability of predicting the seismic performance of earth structures is limited and it is important to recognize that the real application of PBSD in professional practice is still years away. However, it is important to admit that PBSD is attractive and efforts have to be done to make it closer to practitioners. In the seismic design of tailings dams there are two main factors that control the liquefaction resistance of tailings sands: density and fines content. Accordingly, test results showing the effect of these two factors are presented. In the case of large earth dams, the use of coarse materials is common because of their good mechanical behavior. However, the evaluation of their properties is difficult due to the lack of equipment to test large particles. An alternative procedure to evaluate mechanical properties of coarse soils is presented. Additionally, the long term deformations of three large dams are analyzed and an empirical expression to estimate these deformations is proposed.