A model for ultimate bearing capacity of piles in unsaturated soils under elevated temperatures

Abstract

Geo-energy applications such as energy piles can expose unsaturated, deep foundation soils to elevated temperatures. This paper presents a closed-form equation for the ultimate bearing capacity of piles in unsaturated soils subject to elevated temperatures under drained conditions. For this purpose, a temperature-dependent effective stress model was incorporated into calculations of skin resistance and end bearing resistance of piles. The proposed temperature-dependent model is an extension of the modified β method for determining the ultimate pile bearing capacity of unsaturated soils under drained conditions. Employing the proposed model, a parametric study was carried out to evaluate the ultimate pile bearing capacity for hypothetical clay and silt soils at temperatures ranging from 25 °C to 55 °C. For both clay and silt, the results indicated that the ultimate pile bearing capacity varies with an increase in temperature. Different trends with temperature were observed for clay and silt. A monotonic increase in pile resistance was observed in clays. For silt, the pile resistance increased at relatively low matric suction whereas it decreased at higher matric suctions.