Dry stone retaining structures are made of individual decimeter stone blocks in contact with one another. One of the advantages of this construction technology lies in the weak amount of embodied energy required for their construction using only local materials. This technology may therefore be a good answer to the challenges brought about by sustainable […]
Dry stone retaining structures are made of individual decimeter stone blocks in contact with one another. One of the advantages of this construction technology lies in the weak amount of embodied energy required for their construction using only local materials. This technology may therefore be a good answer to the challenges brought about by sustainable policies in civil engineering.
Many of these structures are more than one hundred years old and damage due to aging is a challenging issue for owners. Indeed, normal scientific tools cannot address the specific behavior of such structures and cannot help in the decision-making process. In fact, due to the discrete nature of the system, a large amount of energy can be dissipated at contact level before failure. The shape, arrangement and possible breakage of blocks may play a major role in their overall behavior which is specific to these structures.
This book summarizes two decades of research on dry stone retaining walls and rockfill dams with stone pitching, highlighting how DEM has contributed to a breakthrough in the understanding of their mechanical behavior.