Publications Details

Revisiting the 1980's WIPP room D and B in-situ experiments: Performing thermo-mechanical simulations of rock salt using a state-of-the-art code suite

Arguello, Jose G.; Rath, Jonathan S.

Several "Thermal/Structural Interactions" full-scale in-situ experiments were fielded at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in the mid 1980's. Data from two of these experiments, the Mining Development Test (Room D) and the Overtest for Simulated Defense High-Level Waste (Room B), havebeen used previously to help validate the legacy constitutive models and computer codes used to assess the performance of the disposal facility prior to its licensing and operation. Since then, approximately 30 years of software and hardware advances have yielded efficient software frameworks and enabling tools/infrastructure to produce a new generation of high-fidelity simulation tools. One such current state-of-the-art modeling capability is the computer code suite, SIERRA Mechanics. The capability to model waste repositories is a relatively recent addition to SIERRA Mechanics. Consequently, datafrom the same two WIPP rooms D &B are used in an effort, described herein, aimed at validating the code suite to this class of problems. WIPP Rooms D &B are also being proposed for an international benchmarking exercise between US and German researchers. A review of the salient features for these two rooms that need to be captured in such an exercise will also be described and elaborated. Copyright 2013 ARMA, American Rock Mechanics Association.