DEM simulation of the thermo-geomechanical effect of recycled concrete aggregate assemblies in geothermal pavement bases

Abstract

This paper studies the discrete element modeling (DEM) of the thermal-geomechanical effect of recycled concrete aggregate (RCA) assemblies when harnessing renewable geothermal energy from pavement bases. This research study aims to simulate the behavior of RCA under repeated load triaxial test (RLT) at temperatures varying from 20 °C to 80 °C, to simulate temperature effects when harnessing geothermal energy from pavements. The DEM approach was used to simulate unsaturated soil considering interparticle water meniscus and the variation in its force due to the temperature fluctuation. In this research study, RCA samples with different particle size distributions were simulated under RLT test condition for various temperature conditions. According to the macro-geomechanical results, the resilient modulus (MR), porosity, and accumulated strain of samples showed different trends under varying temperatures. Comparing the micro-geomechanical behavior of the samples indicated that matric suction decreased with increasing temperature. Furthermore, the particle scale matric suction was found to be affected by the size ratio of the contacted particles. It was observed that varying the size ratio between 1 and 4 led to a higher average matric suction. The evolution of coordination number (CN), contact normal and contact normal force indicated that samples with higher sand content experienced decrease in CN and magnitude of contact normal by increasing temperature. Meanwhile, samples with lower sand content tended to have an increased CN and magnitude of contact normal in the direction of anisotropy at increased temperatures. An equation was also proposed to predict MR based on matric suction and the ratio of fine over coarse content, based on the RCA particle sizes.