Probabilistic slope stability analysis: A novel distribution for soils exhibiting highly variable spatial properties

Abstract

Slope stability calculation depends on the soil properties (cohesion and the friction angle) of the soil. Heterogeneous terrains are frequently observed in civil and mining projects where the properties are highly spatially variable. Based on a real data from case studies, this paper presents a probabilistic analysis of the slope stability of highly heterogeneous terrains with a very high coefficient of variation (COV) of the cohesion distribution. The existing deterministic and probabilistic approaches for calculating slope stability lack the capability to effectively consider the significant heterogeneity present in the terrain The objective of the paper is to develop a new bounded interval distribution having a COV that is as high (>150%) as the COV of the cohesion distribution The results obtained with this new distribution are compared to 4 other semi-infinite distributions. To consider the correlation between cohesion and the friction angle, a specific formulation was developed to generate friction angles varying between fixed minimum and maximum limits and having the desired correlation coefficient, mean, and standard deviation. The new cohesion and friction angle distributions were incorporated and tested in a probabilistic numerical model. The new distribution can presently be applied to geotechnical studies for terrains and heterogenous materials with properties exhibiting high spatial variability.