Investigation on the Deformation Law of Inner Waste Dump Slope in an Open-Pit Coal Mine: A Case Study in Southeast Inner Mongolia of China

The settlement and deformation of an open-pit mine waste dump were investigated by using field monitoring and numerical methods. The creep parameters of fine soil sand in the dump fill were inverted using the steady Burgers creep model, and FLAC3D software was used to simulate the dumping soil construction and development program. The results show that the settlement displacement of the dump increases with the time of dumping soil and tends to be stable after 4 years. In the creep attenuation stage of the creep process, there is a big difference between the numerical calculation and the field monitoring results in the inversion process of fine-grained soil sand parameters. In the steady-state creep stage, the numerical calculation is consistent with the field monitoring value. The height of the fill has an influence on the settlement of the fill body of the dump and the time to reach the stability. The higher the filling height is, the greater the postconstruction settlement will be, and the longer it will take to reach stability. The pushing position of the fill body has a great influence on the settlement displacement of the dump. The time and efficiency of soil discharge can be shortened by optimizing the safe distance between the filling body and the river. Based on the numerical calculation results and the empirical settlement function, an analytical method for river channel location selection of internal dump is proposed.

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