Laboratory simulation of karst media dissolution: an experimental approach and a case study

Considering each site’s particular condition, establishing practical measures to enhance our understanding of the site’s behavior patterns will be highly valuable. Having a broad understanding of hydraulic status of a dam site will be highly crucial for providing a suitable substratum to analyze different sources of laboratory test results and to generalize them for real field conditions. In this study, a number of simple assumptions and simplifications were utilized to set up a simulated model to evaluate the rate of karst development beneath a dam site hosted by carbonate rocks. Towards generalizing the laboratory test results to real field scale, a value called the impact coefficient, which is ranging from 2 to 5, was introduced. Conclusions of this study were presented in the form of hosted rock mass’s joint widening and porosity changes during the first 4 years after dam’s impoundment. According to the results, the uniform opening of the joints, with initial opening of 2.5 mm, will be equal to 15.7, 35.2, 61.3, and 93.8 mm for the first 4 years after dam’s impoundment, respectively. The effective porosity growth rate of the IS carbonate rocks will follow an alarming rate, too. These values are estimated to be equal to 3.10, 4.45, 6.24 and 8.49% for the first 4 years after dam’s impoundment, respectively. It should be noted that all the generalizations were made upon the test results at pH 7, considering the implementation of no water sealing methods at the dam construction area. Regardless of the deterministic nature of the proposed procedure used in this study, the results can still serve as a practical guideline to make helpful predictions for future planning and decision-making processes.