Proceedings of the XVI ECSMGE

Geotechnical Engineering for Infrastructure and Development

ISBN 978-0-7277-6067-8

The authors and ICE Publishing: All rights reserved, 2015

doi:10.1680/ecsmge.60678

Artificial Ground Freezing: from applications and case

studies to fundamental research
Conglation artificielle des sols: des applications et tudes de cas la
recherche fondamentale
G.M.B. Viggiani*1 and F. Casini1
1
Universit di Roma Tor Vergata,Roma, Italy
*
Corresponding Author

ABSTRACT The use of Artificial Ground Freezing (AGF) to form earth support systems has had applications worldwide. These cover a
variety of construction problems, including the formation of frozen earth walls to support deep excavations, structural underpinning for
foundation improvement, and temporary control of ground water in construction processes. Excavation of some of the stations of Line 1 of
Napoli Underground through loose granular soils and a fractured soft rock provides a recent example of an extensive and successful appli-
cation of AGF. Construction was accompanied by an intense programme of monitoring designed to measure and control the effects on ad-
jacent structures, which, for its extension and completeness, represented a unique opportunity to collect field data on the performance of
AGF. Significant thaw settlements were systematically recorded at all sites, in many cases larger than the heave recorded during the freez-
ing stages. The paper describes the main phenomena that were observed during construction and some of the early analyses that were car-
ried out to interpret different aspects of the process, and then illustrates some recent work conducted in the framework of an international
co-operative research project involving academics and technical personnel and engineers of Napoli underground. This includes a prelimi-
nary experimental investigation of the behaviour of pyroclastic soils on freezing/thawing cycles, the calibration of a fully coupled termo-
hydro-mechanical constitutive model against available experimental data, and its application to the back analyses of Toledo Station. The
final goal of the research is to be able to model the AGF process accurately, thus gaining confidence in the design of other works from the
engineering point of view.
RSUM L'utilisation de la conglation artificielle des sols pour former des systmes de soutnement a eu de nombreuses applications
dans le monde entier. Celles-ci vont de la formation de murs de sol gel pour le soutnement dexcavations profondes au soutien structurel
pour l'amlioration des fondations, ou encore le contrle temporaire du niveau de la nappe phratique pendant la construction. Excavation
de certaines stations de la Ligne 1 du Mtro de Naples dans des sols granulaires et une roche fracture fournit un exemple rcent d'une ap-
plication extensive et russie de la technique de conglation des sols. Un programme consquent de surveillance a t conu et mis en place
pour mesurer et contrler les effets induits par lexcavation sur les structures adjacentes; ce qui, par son extension et son caractre exhaus-
tif, reprsentait une occasion unique de recueillir des donnes de terrain sur la performance de la technique. Des tassements significatifs
dus au dgel ont t systmatiquement enregistrs sur tous les sites, souvent plus importants que les soulvements mesurs au cours de la
conglation. Larticle prsente les principaux phnomnes qui ont t observs pendant la construction, ainsi quune partie des premires
analyses qui ont t effectues afin dinterprter les diffrents aspects du processus. On prsente galement certains travaux effectus r-
cemment dans le cadre d'un projet de recherche international impliquant la fois des chercheurs, du personnel technique et des ingnieurs,
par exemple une tude exprimentale prliminaire du comportement des sols pyroclastiques sous cycles de gel/dgel, l'talonnage d'un mo-
dle constitutif thermo-hydro-mcanique entirement coupl a partir des donnes exprimentales disponibles, ainsi que son application
l'analyse du comportement observ de la station Toledo. Lobjectif final de cette tude est une modlisation raliste de la conglation arti-
ficielle des sols, ce qui nous permettrait damliorer la conception d'autres ouvrages d'ingnierie souterraine.

1 INTRODUCTION hand, man-made freezing is a controllable process

that can be used by civil engineers to stabilize tempo-
Natural freezing occurs seasonally in many areas of rarily the ground in order to support and/or exclude
the globe and can affect negatively the engineering groundwater from an excavation until the final retain-
performance of geotechnical structures; on the other ing and lining structures are constructed.

65
Geotechnical Engineering for Infrastructure and Development
The last decade has seen an increased use of Arti-
ficial Ground Freezing (AGF) in underground con-
struction; many recent examples are reported in the
literature of structures such as station tunnels, pas-
sageways, and shafts that have been successfully
completed using AGF under very diverse geotech-
nical conditions all over the world (see e.g. Pimentel
et al. 2012, Yu et al. 2005, Ha & Schfers 2013).
Besides protecting excavations, AGF can be used to
stabilise slopes, retrieve undisturbed samples of
coarse grained soils, construct temporary access
roads, and maintain permafrost below pipeline foun-
dations and heated buildings (Harris 1995). Labora-
tory and full field experiments have also demonstrat-
ed the effectiveness of AGF for the containment of
subsurface hazardous and radioactive waste (Dash et
al. 1997); the US Department of Energy has desig-
nated frozen ground barriers as one of its top ten re-
mediation technologies and the technique has been
considered as a possible solution to radioactive con-
tamination of the water surrounding the compro-
mised Fukushima nuclear power plant.
The paper describes a successful application of
AGF during construction of some of the stations of
Line 1 of Napoli Underground; here the technique
was extensively used to ensure stability and control
ground water flow during excavation of the station
tunnels through loose granular soils and a fractured
soft rock of pyroclastic origin. In some instances, the
innovative techniques that were implemented had
almost the character of full scale experiments; there-
fore, construction of the line was accompanied by an
intense program of monitoring designed to measure
and/or control the construction processes and their ef-
fects on adjacent structures.
The growing awareness of the merits of artificial
ground freezing as a temporary ground improvement
system with minimal environmental impact is direct-
ly related to the progress made in the understanding
of the behaviour of frozen soils. However, there is
still scope for fundamental research to be carried out
in the areas of constitutive modelling and experi-
mental characterisation of the mechanical behaviour
of frozen/unfrozen ground, particularly to clarify
some aspects of the response of frozen ground to
freeze/thaw cycles. Freezing and thawing of the pore
fluid within soils involve complex thermal, hydraulic
and mechanical processes that have significant mutu-
66
al interactions. For example, phase changes of the
pore fluid caused by temperature variations can mod-
ify the hydraulic regime of the soil, which in turn can
induce mechanical deformation. At the same time,
any changes in the hydraulic and mechanical condi-
tions affect the thermal processes by advection and
changes of ice and water contents.
A research project bringing together constitutive
modelling, laboratory tests and field data was started
as an international co-operation involving Universitat
Politcnica de Catalunya Barcelona, Universit di
Roma Tor Vergata, Seconda Universit di Napoli,
and technical personnel and engineers involved in the
design and construction of Napoli underground. The
paper will illustrate some recent results obtained in
the framework of this co-operation. These include
the results of a preliminary experimental investiga-
tion of the behaviour of pyroclastic soils on freez-
ing/thawing cycles, the calibration of a fully coupled
termo-hydro-mechanical constitutive model against
available experimental data, and its application to the
back analyses of Toledo Station.
The final goal of the research is to be able to mod-
el the construction process accurately, thus gaining
confidence in the design of similar works from the
engineering point of view.
2 LINE 1 OF NAPOLI UNDERGROUND
Metropolitana di Napoli, or Napoli Underground, is
the metro system serving the city of Napoli. At pre-
sent, it includes six underground rapid transit railway
lines, a commuter rail network, and four funicular
lines, with planned upgrading and expansion work
underway. The idea of a fully integrated urban rail
network was proposed in the 1950s as part of the
post-war regeneration effort; plans were first formu-
lated in the 1960s, but funding, planning, and devel-
opment problems all caused long delays. Construc-
tion began in 1976 and the first 4-km-long rapid
transit line opened in 1993, running between Colli
Aminei and Vanvitelli Stations; two years later, the
line was extended to reach Piscinola, for an overall
track length of 13 km (Briginshaw 1999).
The City Transport Plan, approved by the Munici-
pality in 1997, included three main phases of re-
development. Phase 1 consisted of an expansion to

five lines, to take the network up to 53 km of track
(45 km of existing lines), with 68 stations (23 newly
built), and 12 interchange nodes, and was completed
by 2002. Phase 2 was designed to increase the net-
work to 7 lines, with 84 stations, and 16 interchange
nodes, and is currently under way. Phase 3 will see
the network expanded to 10 rail lines with 93 km of
track, and a further 30 km of new light rail linking
114 stations, with 21 interchanges. Once the plan is
completed, 70% of Neapolitans should be living
within 500 meters of a transport access point.
The final layout of Line 1 of Napoli Underground,
as per the City Transport Plan of 1997, consists of a
closed ring connecting the northern outskirts of the
city, the area of the hills, the historical centre, the
administrative district, and the airport, for a total
length of about 40 km and 25 stations (see Figure 1).
Chiaiano
Piscinola
Miano
13 km (9)
Frullone
completed 1998
8 km (5)
Colli Aminei
completed 2002
Policlinico
Rione Alto
6 km (5)
Montedonzelli
completed
UNIVERSIT 2011 Medaglie d'Oro Materdei
TOLEDO 2013
GARIBALDI 2013
7 km (4) Salvator
construction Quattro Rosa
Dante
Giornate
5 km (2)
Vanvitelli
design Toledo
Figure 1. Line 1 of Napoli Underground.
The first part of the line, between Piscinola and
Dante Stations, started operating in 1998 and was
completed by 2002. Construction of the following
6 km proved to be very problematic as the excava-
tions required for the five stations included in this
part of the line had to be constructed through coarse-
grained soils and well below the water table, in an
extremely densely built urban environment with
many buildings of historical and artistic value. Fur-
thermore, significant direct interferences between the
line and buried archaeological remnants arose during
construction (Lobell & Merola 2008), particularly at
Municipio Station, where the works exposed part of
the structures of the Roman port of the city, and at
Duomo Station, where a Roman building of Imperial
Viggiani and Casini
age was uncovered by excavation. In fact, in these
two cases, the original design had to be changed to
accommodate for the outstanding archaeological
findings, and the two stations are slightly lagging be-
hind the rest of the line, which is otherwise complet-
ed.
At present, Universit, Toledo, and Garibaldi Sta-
tions are open to the public, bringing the number of
operating stations on Line 1 to a total of 17. In an
ordinary working day, about 135 000 passengers al-
ready travel on the line; this should increase to an es-
timated 500 000 people per day, or 40 000 people per
hour in rush hour, once the line is completed (Cascet-
ta 2000). All three stations have received the atten-
tion of the international community: Toledo Station
was voted the most beautiful European Station by the
Daily Telegraph and by CNN, while, in 2011, Uni-
versit Station won the Emirates Leaf International
Award in London.
Capodichino
Aeroporto 2.1 Ground conditions
Poggioreale Figure 2 shows the ground profile and groundwater
Tribunale
conditions along the part of Line 1 under examina-
Centro
tion. All the natural deposits within the depths of in-
Direzionale terest are geologically recent and were formed in a
Museo
relatively short period of time. The Yellow Tuff and
Garibaldi
the Pozzolanas were deposited about 12 000 years
ago, as a result of the volcanic activity of the nearby
Duomo
Phlegrean complex. The Yellow Tuff is a soft rock
Municipio Universit with a compressive strength between 1 and 6 MPa,
characterized by the occurrence of randomly distrib-
uted sub-vertical fractures, locally known as scar-
pine, probably generated by rapid cooling of the py-
roclastic mass after eruption and deposition.
Following deposition, erosion of the pyroclastic for-
mations occurred over a period of about 2 000 years,
causing material to be transported and re-deposited.
The remoulded Pozzolanas are very well graded and
not easily distinguished from the original intact pyro-
clastic deposits; they appear layered and sometimes
inter-bedded with in situ Pozzolanas, or sometimes
with marine sand deposits, such as encountered in the
area of Municipio Station. After erosion and re-
deposition of the pyroclastic formations, a new ex-
plosive phase of the Phlegrean complex deposited the
so-called Neapolitan Pyroclastic Pile, which consists
of easily eroded alternating layers of pumices, ashes,
pozzolana and lapilli and, where not eroded, has a
67
Geotechnical Engineering for Infrastructure and Development

thickness of about 15 m. The pyroclastic deposits are
overlain by sands or silty sands of marine or fluvial
lacustrine origin. Most of the coastal areas of the city
derive from relatively recent reclamations (1400
1800); this is reflected in the thickness of the made
ground, which, in some areas, can reach more than
10 m. The water table is relatively close to ground
surface.
high pore pressures, together with the random occur-
rence of scarpine in the tuff, made it necessary to
bore the running tunnels with closed-shield earth
pressure balance machines, andthe station tunnels,
which were enlarged by conventional mining, had to
be constructed with the aid of a variety of ground
improvement methods, including chemical injections,
cement grouting, and the extensive use of artificial
ground freezing, which is the main subject of this pa-
per.

Figure 2. Soil profile and groundwater conditions.

The pyroclastic deposits are very common in the

area of Napoli and have very well known physical
and mechanical properties (see e.g. Aversa et al.
2013); because of their granular nature, they were
characterised mainly by in situ penetration tests, such
as CPTs and SPTs (Viggiani & de Sanctis 2009). In
many ways, the most important aspect of the ge-
otechnical investigation was the definition of the lev-
el of the roof of the Yellow Tuff formation.

2.2 Design issues and use of AGF

The preliminary design of the line between Duomo
and Garibaldi consisted of shallow tunnels construct-
ed by cut-and-cover. At a later stage, it was decided
to bore the tunnels within the Yellow Tuff formation,
because this would both minimise direct interfer-
ences with the archaeological layer and reduce limi-
tations to the surface traffic during construction Figure 3. Layout of Municipio, Universit, Duomo, and Garibaldi
(Viggiani 2000). The good mechanical properties of Stations.
the tuff also reduced the risk of settlements and hence
potential damage to nearby structures. The main The layouts of Municipio, Universit, Duomo, and
drawback associated with this design is that a long Garibaldi stations are all very similar (Figure 3, Ma-
part of the line is well below the groundwater table, iorano et al. 2002). They consist of rectangular
with hydraulic heads between 25 and 30 m. The very shafts containing the escalators and other plants, with

68

dimensions in plan ranging between 4623 m2 and
4416 m2, and depths between 35 and 45 m; four
platform tunnels, and other horizontal and inclined
passageways are located outside the shafts.
Support for the open excavations was provided by
reinforced concrete diaphragm walls, typically sup-
ported by steel tubular props at the surface and 4 to 6
levels of pre-stressed anchors. Platform tunnels are
generally contained within the Neapolitan Yellow
Tuff, while inclined access passageways run at least
in part in the granular soils; both were excavated by
conventional mining. At Municipio, Universit, and
Garibaldi stations, these works were carried out with
the extensive use of AGF, to ensure stability and wa-
terproofing during excavation below the ground wa-
ter table (Viggiani & de Sanctis 2009, Cavuoto et al.
2011; Russo et al. 2012). At present, the use of AGF
at Municipio is being considered again, to construct
two short tunnels connecting the stations of Line 1
and of Line 6, with a modification to the original de-
sign, which was based on chemical and cement injec-
tions. At Duomo, where the station develops mostly
in the Yellow Tuff, AGF was used only to excavate
one inclined passageway, which runs partly in the
pozzolanas.
In all these stations, AGF was typically carried out
by driving freeze tubes into the ground parallel to the
tunnel length around the future excavation section,
and then circulating a refrigerating fluid into the
tubes until the temperature of the ground around the
tubes was below the freezing point of water. Freez-
ing was activated with liquid nitrogen, entered at
about -196C, and then vented as gas to the atmos-
phere at -60C to -100C, and maintained using brine
(calcium chloride) entered at about -35C, and then
re-circulated through a refrigeration plant. The con-
tractor specified that construction of both platform
tunnels and inclined passageways should be under-
taken within 1 m thick frozen collars with external
surfaces at a temperature of -10C. The growth of
the frozen body was monitored with temperature sen-
sors located within secondary holes parallel to the
freeze pipes.
Toledo Station, which will be described better in
the final part of this paper, has a very different layout
from the other four stations on this part of the line,
with a vertical shaft connected to a large service tun-
nel giving access to the four platform tunnels. The
Viggiani and Casini
excavation required to create the service tunnel, was
carried out with the aid of AGF at the crown, which
is contained mostly in pozzolana, and chemical and
cement injections at the sidewalls and at the invert,
which are contained in tuff.
Owing to the many variables affecting it, it is very
difficult to assign firmly a figure to the cost of AGF
per cubic metre of frozen ground. The major factors
affecting the final cost of the treatment include:
ground and ground water conditions, spacing of the
freezing pipes, available time for freezing and time
over which freezing has to be maintained. In com-
paring the costs of AGF with more conventional
ground improvement and support systems, one also
has to consider the potential cost and time savings
that may be associated with eliminating other works
that may otherwise be necessary to carry out safely
excavation such as, e.g. dewatering or ground im-
provement by chemical and cement injections. Expe-
rience demonstrates that, although at first impression
AGF may appear costly, in many cases it is less ex-
pensive than more conventional systems; as an ex-
ample, Table 1 gives an indication of the costs of
AGF as implemented on Line 1.
Table 1. Costs of AGF on Line 1 of Napoli Underground.
cost AGF*
nitrogen brine
activation maintenance
/m3 exc. tunnel 589 129 82
/m3 frozen ground 908 232 113
* including horizontal directional drilling, installation of freeze
and secondary holes, use of preventers, etc
The experience gained in the works of Line 1 of Na-
poli underground is significant mainly because of the
size of the intervention: for each station, a volume of
approximately 33 000 m3 of ground was frozen to
permit excavation of the four station tunnels, with a
cross section of 87 m2 and a length of 40 to 70 m, and
of the four inclined passageways, with cross section
of about 40 m2 and a length of 25 m (Colombo 2010).
Due to the complexity of the works, construction was
accompanied by an intense programme of monitoring
designed to measure and/or control the effects of
construction on adjacent structures, which, for its ex-
tension and completeness, represented a unique op-
portunity to collect field data on the performance of
AGF.
69
Geotechnical Engineering for Infrastructure and Development

Figure 4. Plan of Garibaldi Station with indication of monitoring points and construction stages.

3 THE EARLY APPLICATIONS thus preventing ingress of water into the excavated
area from the existing system of scarpine. Figure 6
Garibaldi Station was the first to be constructed. illustrates the recorded settlements of reference point
Figure 4 shows its plan view with the position of B8 on Building B during station excavation, ground
some of the installed instrumentation, and summaris- freezing, bottom sealing treatment, and construction
es the sequence of construction stages. Four floor of platform Tunnel B1.
slabs, constructed top down, provided support in the
upper part of the excavation, and, in its lower part,
six levels of anchors with lengths between 12 and
31 m were installed. At the top of the retaining
walls, one level of tubular steel props further restrict-
ed wall movements. Two relatively large residential
masonry buildings, 37 m 74 m size in plan and of
five and seven storeys, were located very close to the
station box at a minimum distance of about 3.6 m,
and the settlements of their foundations during con-
struction were measured by precision levelling.
The excavation of the station box began in Octo-
ber 2002 and was completed almost exactly two
years later, in October 2004. Work on the platform
tunnels began after completion of the main excava-
tion, in mid-October 2004, and was completed by
February 2007. At Garibaldi Station, the crown of Figure 5. Freeze holes installed around one of the platform tunnels
at Garibaldi Station.
the platform tunnels is always contained within the
Neapolitan Yellow Tuff so that AGF was implement- During the freezing stages (November 2004 to Ju-
ed mainly as a protective measure to create an im- ly 2005), heave was recorded at the ground surface,
permeable collar around each tunnel (see Figure 5),

70
 Viggiani and Casini

while during excavation and subsequent installation portant: even if the freeze holes were inserted using
of permanent lining in frozen ground, the settlements directional drilling heads, over the required length of
of the building increased, and they continued to in- about 50 m, deviations from the design alignment
were unavoidable. Figure 7 shows the "as built" po-

mag-04
mag-03

mag-05

mag-06
nov-02

nov-03

nov-05

nov-06
nov-04
May 03 May 04 May 05 May 06 sitions of the freeze holes around platform Tunnel B1
0
0,0
in Piazza Garibaldi. The shaded areas correspond to

(1)
(1) (2)
(3)
positions where one may expect problems in the for-
(mm)

(2) (3)
10
-10,0
settlement (mm)

(4)
(4) mation of the ice wall or a reduced thickness because
20 (5) of the increased spacing between contiguous freeze
cedimenti [mm]
settlement

-20,0 (5)
Punto B8
Edificio lato CDN holes.
30
-30,0

(6)
(6)
(7)
(7) 30
40
-40,0

temperature, T ( C)
20
GT11
50
-50,0

10
Figure 6. Settlements of reference point B8 on Building B. (1) and
(2): Installation of anchors; (2) and (3): Ground freezing; (4): Ex- 0 GT12
cavation of platform tunnel; (5): Permanent lining installation; (5) GT10
and (6): Thawing; (7): Corrective measures by underpinning. -10
GT13
-20 GT14
crease, at dramatic rates, as thawing proceeded. This
was due to a combination of volume loss at the tun- -30
15/11/04 07/02/05 02/05/05 25/07/05 17/11/05
nel, water flow into the excavated area through im-
perfections in the ice lining, particularly at the con- Figure 8. Garibaldi Station: temperatures measured around Tunnel
nection between the diaphragm wall and the station B1 at 48.5 m distance from the diaphragm wall.
tunnel, and thawing. Such unfavourable rates of set-
tlement at the ground surface appeared incompatible The restitution of the temperature measurements
with the safety of the existing buildings and, conse- in the freeze holes, affected by similar problems of
quently, their foundations were underpinned by mi- deviation from the design position, was originally
cro-piles, thus preventing further movements. carried out only in terms of time histories of meas-
ured temperatures along the secondary tubes. An ex-
ample of these measurements is given in Figure 8,
showing the temperatures measured at different posi-
tions around Tunnel B1, at 48.5 m from the dia-
phragm wall; it can be noted that, probably due to
deviation of the secondary holes from the intended
positions, the temperatures measured at positions
GT12 and GT11 were not reaching the design target
values even after prolonged freezing. The retarded
response of some of the temperature sensors is re-
flected in the long duration of the freezing stages be-
fore the start of tunnel excavation, particularly for
tunnels B1 (9 months) and A1 (11 months), which
were the first to be constructed (see Figure 4).
Prolonged ground freezing affected adversely the
performance of the retaining structures of the station
Figure 7. Garibaldi Station: "as built" positions of the freeze holes box. Figure 9 shows the horizontal displacements of
around platform Tunnel B1. one of the panels towards the excavation in the fro-
zen area, obtained by convergence measurements on
Checking for freeze tube alignment was very im- targets established on the diaphragm wall. From the

71
Geotechnical Engineering for Infrastructure and Development

start of freezing, an increase of the outward horizon- 22i 21i 20i

19i 18i
17i
16i
15i 13i ST7

tal displacement of the diaphragm wall of up to

16=ST6 14i 11A
ST4 23

24 20=ST5 12

30 mm was recorded, which was about the same as

25
27 26 11 ST8
ST3

the maximum horizontal displacement due to excava-

10
28 9B

9A

tion of the station.

29
7
30
6
ST2
31
5i ST9
32 5

33
34A 4

(a)
34B 35 3
2
ST1 ST10
36 1
16 15 1
17 3 2
ST14 14 10 4
7 ST11
13 6 5
11 9
ST13 8 ST12

(b)

Figure 9. Garibaldi Station: horizontal displacements of Panel P7

towards the excavation.

18/10/04 freezing 02/05/05 freezing

activation at crown activation at invert
2.0
205 (-18.7 m asl)

1.6
305 (-23.0 m asl)
anchor load (MN)

1.2
nominal load
(c)
0.8
205

0.4 305 405 (-27.5 m asl)

405
0.0
22/07/04 19/01/04 19/03/05 17/06/05

Figure 10. Garibaldi Station: loads recorded at some instrumented

anchors during the freezing stages - axis of Tunnel B1.

Figure 10 shows the loads recorded at some in-

strumented anchors corresponding to the axis of
Tunnel B1, which, during freezing, increased of up to
about 40%, taking some of them close to their pullout
value. Both phenomena were probably due to the
formation of a continuously growing ice lens behind
the diaphragm wall, as a result of the frozen front at-
tracting water because of the negative pore water
pressures that developed around the frozen fringe.
(d)
Figure 11. Municipio Station - Tunnel B1 18 m from diaphragm
wall: actual positions of freeze and observation holes (a); contours
of iso-temperature at the end of nitrogen activation (b), after 26
days of maintenance with brine (c), and after localised re-
activation with nitrogen (d).

72

At a later stage in the project, the measured tem-
peratures were processed to produce contours of iso-
temperature around the tunnel; Figure 11(a) shows
the actual positions of the freeze holes and of the ob-
servation holes around platform Tunnel B1 at Muni-
cipio Station at 18 m distance from the diaphragm
wall, together with the contours of iso-temperature at
the end of nitrogen activation, Figure 11(b) and after
26 days of maintenance with brine, Figure 11(c).
Figure 12. Municipio Station: plan showing position of instrumen-
tation (a); settlements (b) and piezometric head (c), recorded dur-
ing construction of platform Tunnels A1 and B1.
At this time, the frozen wall, as identified by the
iso-line at -10C (darker colour), appears discontinu-
Viggiani and Casini
ous and fragmented, particularly near the crown,
probably due to the high groundwater seepage veloci-
ties in the fractures of the tuff which prevent the clo-
sure of the freezing body obtained during nitrogen
activation. This is a much more useful representation
of the data in terms of construction process control,
permitting localised re-activation of nitrogen freezing
for repair, as shown in Figure 11(d).
Figure 12 shows the settlements of a five-storey
masonry building located at a distance of about 9 m
from Municipio station box, during construction of
platform Tunnels A1 and B1, together with the pie-
zometric head measured at four piezometers located
immediately outside the corners of the excavation.
During excavation of Tunnel B1 under AGF protec-
tion, the settlements of the building were accompa-
nied by significant reductions of the water head rec-
orded at all piezometers around the station. This is
likely to result from the tunnel acting as a drain, due
to imperfections in the formation of the ice ring, as
indicated by the data in Figure 13 comparing the
measured water flow rate into Tunnel A1 and tunnel
advancement in time.
Figure 13. Municipio Station: (a) tunnel advancement, and (b) wa-
ter flow rate into tunnel.
A field trial of AGF was conducted at Municipio,
with the main purposes of optimizing the in situ
ground freezing technique and of determining the
consumption of coolant needed for the formation of a
barrier of frozen ground characterized by the mini-
mum requirements of the project (temperature of the
frozen front, T = -10 C, thickness, s = 1m).
Figure 14 shows the layout of the field trial, which
included 5 vertical freeze holes, 5 vertical secondary
observation holes to measure the temperature of the
73
Geotechnical Engineering for Infrastructure and Development

4 HEAT PROPAGATION ANALYSES

De-coupled thermal (T) or partly coupled, hydro-

Figure 14. Layout of the field trial at Municipio Station including
freeze holes (A, C), secondary holes (T), and boreholes (PF).
ground, and two boreholes, to a maximum depth of
31.5 m bgl, to retrieve 19 undisturbed samples of
Pozzolana (10) and Tuff (9) for laboratory testing,
before and after freezing. The in situ experimental
program included nitrogen freezing tests, brine
freezing tests, and mixed freezing tests with nitrogen
activation and brine maintenance (de Sanctis 2006).
An example of the recorded temperatures at the
experimental site is given in Figure 15.
20
-10.5 m
freezing
(N + CaCl2)
10
-16.0 m
-21.5 m
-27.0 m
T ( C)
thermal (TH) analyses can be carried out to evaluate
the time needed to achieve the required temperatures
in the ground, and the associated refrigerating fluid
and energy consumption.
Assuming that there is no seepage through the fro-
zen body, i.e., that the seepage velocity is null, the
convective heat transport is not modelled and the
equation for heat transport contains only diffusive
terms plus the latent heat released at the frozen front
during phase change. Even neglecting the hydro-
thermal coupling, transient heat propagation in freez-
ing ground in the presence of phase changes of the
pore water is a highly non-linear problem as the
thermal diffusivity of ice is about eight times that of
liquid water, so that the propagating ice front sepa-
rates the domain in two regions with very different
thermal properties.
The problem of defining the evolution in space
and time of the propagating ice front was tackled for
the first time in the pioneering works by Lam and
Clapeyron (1831) and Stefan (1891). Analytical so-
lutions are available for one-dimensional layouts and
simple boundary and initial conditions (Sanger &
Sayles 1979); for more complex layouts, approxi-
mate, semi-analytical, or numerical solutions have
been developed and their results checked against the

0 available experimental evidence (see, e.g. ziik

1989 ).
-10 In this case (Viggiani & de Sanctis 2009), the
problem was tackled numerically with plane strain
-20 numerical analyses carried out using the FE code
freezing thawing ABAQUS. The platform tunnels at Municipio Sta-
(CaCl2) tion have an equivalent diameter of 10.6 m and there
-30
are 53 freeze tubes around each of them. As reported
06/12/05 05/01/06 04/02/06 06/03/06 above, in the applications for the stations of Line 1,
Figure 15. Temperatures measured at different depths along sec- freezing was generally activated with nitrogen and
ondary hole T1. maintained with brine. This permitted to reduce the
time required for the formation of the frozen collar to
An important by product of the experimental field a few weeks and overcome the main reason for in-
trial was the definition of thermal properties that complete or inadequate ground freezing, which is the
govern the phenomenon of heat diffusion in a porous excessive seepage of water in the vicinity of the ice
medium, by numerical back-analysis of the freezing barrier, while containing the maintenance costs. At
process with finite elements. the end of the nitrogen activation phase, before brine
can be circulated, the temperature in the freeze tubes
has to rise to -40C, otherwise the brine would freeze

74
 Viggiani and Casini

in the tubes. In many cases, however, before brine

was circulated, the inner copper tube of the freeze
holes had to be replaced by a polyethylene pipe to
avoid corrosion, and the time required to change the
inner tube on all the probes, typically one or two
days, was long enough to ensure that the temperature
inside the freeze holes would rise to about -40C. In
this time interval, the frozen front continues to ex-
pand, as a result of thermal inertia.

Figure 17. Nitrogen freezing: evolution with time of (a) tempera-

tures at point A, and (b) thickness of frozen wall.

Figure 16. Details of the FE mesh showing the position of the

freezing tubes.

In the FE analyses, the interaction between four

freezing tubes was considered, as shown in Figure
16. The imposed boundary conditions were a con-
stant temperature of 15C at a sufficient distance
from the tubes not to be affected by AGF, and a tem-
perature of -174C or -40C at the surface of the
freeze tubes, depending on the freezing stage. The
thermal properties of the soil were obtained by back Figure 18. Brine freezing: evolution with time of (a) temperatures
at point A, and (b) thickness of frozen wall.
analysis of the instrumented trial field at the site of
Municipio Station. Figure 17 and 18 show the evolu-
brine it is necessary to wait about 25 days to obtain
tion with time of (a) the predicted temperatures at
the same frozen thickness. A series of analyses were
point A in Figure 16, and (b) the thickness of the fro-
carried out of nitrogen activation and brine mainte-
zen wall, defined as the distance between two con-
nance with different activation times. Figure 19
tours of iso-temperature at -10C, for nitrogen and
gives the thickness of the frozen wall at the end of ni-
brine freezing, respectively. From the results it is
trogen activation, after the time required for the tem-
clear that there is no interaction any further than two
perature around the freeze holes to be above -40C
freezing pipes, as the results obtained for four pipes
(thawing) and after about 35 days of brine mainte-
are not substantially different than those for two
nance. It is clear that, if nitrogen is used until a 1 m
pipes. While using four freezing tubes and nitrogen
thick wall is created, as per design requirements, by
freezing the required thickness of 1 m is obtained af-
the end of the thawing stage, a larger wall than re-
ter only about 5 days, if the system is operated with
quested is obtained at the end of thawing, and this is

75
Geotechnical Engineering for Infrastructure and Development
Figure 19. Evolution with time of the thickness of frozen wall for
different durations of the nitrogen activation phase.
not economical; on the other hand, if nitrogen freez-
ing is stopped too early, the frozen thickness at the
end of thawing is insufficient. The optimum proce-
dure can be established by numerical trial and error,
depending on the required time to start excavation.
As pointed out by Colombo (2010), who analysed
realistic layouts of freezing tubes similar to those
used during construction of Napoli Underground, it is
difficult to compare directly the results of these type
of analyses with the data collected in situ, since
groundwater seepage, not included in the model, may
delay or prevent the closure of the freezing body.
In principle, TH coupled analyses, solving the
generalised, transient heat transport equation, consid-
ering non zero seepage velocities and convective heat
transport, and taking into account temperature-
dependent material parameters (specific heat and heat
conductivity) and phase change effects, including la-
tent heat, arbitrary layouts of the freeze pipes and
time-dependent boundary conditions (e.g. variable
freeze pipe temperatures) should be carried out to
model realistically the problem. A numerical code
with these features was developed at ETH (Sres
2009) and implemented in a FE program (Papa-
konstantinou et al. 2012).
In practice, however, as the water seepage takes
place mostly in the system of randomly distributed
sub-vertical fractures in the tuff, whose location is
unknown before the execution of the works, it is dif-
ficult to carry out truly predictive calculations of the
imperfections in the frozen barrier.
76
5 MODELLING
Frozen ground is soil or rock with a temperature be-
low the freezing point of water (0C). The definition
is based entirely on temperature and is independent
of the water and ice content of the soil or of the rock
(Andersland & Landanyi 2004). The two main ef-
fects of an increasing ice content in the soil as the
temperature decreases are (i) the increase of soil
strength and (ii) the decrease of permeability, which
makes the frozen soil impervious to water seepage.
It has been long recognized that the mechanical
properties of frozen ground depend markedly not on-
ly on temperature but also on time: in particular, their
strength and stiffness at working loads are signifi-
cantly affected by the rate of applied deformation.
The thermo-hydro-mechanical processes induced
by freezing and thawing of pore fluid within soils are
complex and can have significant mutual interaction
(Nishimura et al. 2009). Assuming that the soil is
saturated, when the temperature drops to 0C, the
water least bound to the solid surface starts to freeze.
As the temperature drops further, more liquid water
becomes frozen in a progressive manner. Liquid wa-
ter/ice interfaces appear, which play a role similar to
that of the liquid/gas interfaces in unsaturated soils.
A consequence of this process is that liquid water de-
velops increasing values of suction as temperature
reduces: this suction is responsible for attracting wa-
ter from the unfrozen soil areas, in response to the
difference in potential. Also, as the temperature de-
creases, the ice content of the soil increases; the ice
becomes a bonding agent between soil particles or
blocks of rock, increasing the strength of the
soil/rock mass and modifying the pore water pres-
sures and the effective stress on the soil skeleton,
which, in turn, induces mechanical deformation. At
the same time, any changes in the hydraulic and me-
chanical boundary conditions can affect the thermal
processes by advection and changes of ice and water
contents (Gens 2010).
Several models for the behaviour of frozen
ground, with various degrees of sophistication de-
pending on their particular application purposes, have
been developed and implemented. However, a solid
framework, including also the transient effects, has
yet to be established for fully coupled THM ap-
proaches. Historically, most geotechnical analyses of

frozen soils adopted total-stress-based mechanical
treatments (e.g. Andersland & Ladanyi 2004), some-
times combined with uncoupled thermal analyses.
Total-stress analyses have continued to be adopted in
more recently proposed models. Sometimes, in the
applications for underground construction, a simple
approach is taken in which freezing and thawing and
the mechanical interaction between the frozen ring
and the surrounding soil are studied separately, in de-
coupled analyses. Examples of this approach are re-
ported in e.g. De Santis (2006) and Rampello et al.
(2011); in both cases an attempt to predict ground
heave on freezing and subsequent settlements on
thawing was carried out by finite element analyses
imposing freezing-induced volume strains to the
ground, while the mechanical interaction between the
frozen ring and the surrounding ground was tackled
by assigning increased strength and stiffness to the
frozen ring depending on the temperature.
Parallel efforts to simulate mass and heat transfer
problems in freezing and thawing soils have led to
independent developments in TH-coupled models.
Extensive literature reviews are reported by Nishi-
mura et al. (2009), Gens (2010) and Pimentel et al.
(2012). A common feature of TH-coupled models is
their lack of an explicit formulation for the mechani-
cal behaviour of the soil skeleton. In hydrodynamic
models, mechanical equilibrium is usually not con-
sidered, while in other approaches the soil skeleton
stresses are only implicitly invoked in the particle
segregation criteria. When shear stresses and soil de-
formation play a significant role, as in many bounda-
ry value problems, an independent treatment is re-
quired outside the TH-coupled framework. It is
desirable that the mechanical constitutive model for
frozen soils has continuity with the effective-stress
constitutive model applied to unfrozen soils, as most
boundary value problems involve both states, and
transient moving boundaries between them.
6 A FULLY COUPLED THM CONSTITUTIVE
MODEL FOR FROZEN SOIL
A THM formulation for low temperature problems in
water-saturated soils was developed by Nishimura et
al. (2009) based on the THM model originally devel-
oped by Olivella et al. (1994, 1996) and Gens et al.
Viggiani and Casini
(1998) for high temperature problems involving a gas
phase, and implemented in the finite element code
CODE_BRIGHT. In this formulation, the gas phase
is replaced by a second solid phase representing ice.
The governing equations were developed from fun-
damental physical requirements, taking into account
the interactions between thermal, hydraulic, and me-
chanical processes in frozen soils. The formulation
includes a critical state constitutive model that adopts
net stress and suction as stress variables, which re-
duces to an effective stress-based model similar to
Modified Cam-Clay under unfrozen conditions.
In the model, the mechanisms linking the change
in volume of the liquid phase relative to the ice phase
are defined as a function of the thermodynamic prop-
erties of water; the liquid ice-surface tension, li, de-
veloping at the interface between the two phases as
the temperature decreases, is balanced by the differ-
ence of pressure in frozen and liquid water, pi and pl
(see Figure 20), and thermodynamic equilibrium be-
tween the two phases is given by the Clausius-
Clayperon-Poynting equation.
Figure 20. Suction development at the ice-water interface.
The link between the degree of saturation of liquid
(unfrozen) water, Sl, and suction, defined as the dif-
ference between the pressures of ice and liquid water,
s = pi - pl, is represented using the van Genuchten
(1980) equation (freezing retention model). As suc-
tion depends on temperature and liquid pressure, us-
ing the van Genuchten equation, it is possible to ob-
tain the relationship between Sl and T. Finally, the
ratio between the permeability of the soil containing
ice (Sl 1), and the permeability of fully saturated
unfrozen soil (Sl = 1), is obtained considering the link
between the relative permeability and the degree of
saturation of the liquid phase (Mualem 1976, van
Genuchten 1980).
77
Geotechnical Engineering for Infrastructure and Development
The mechanical behaviour of the solid skeleton is
modelled using an extension to frozen soils of the
Barcelona Basic Model (BBM, Alonso et al. 1990),
with a two-stress variable constitutive relationship
(Nishimura et al. 2009) making use of net stress,
n = - max(pl, pi), and suction, s = max(pi - p, 0).
Effective stress approaches, using a single (Bishop)
effective stress variable, in which the gas pressure is
replaced by ice pressure, have also been proposed in
the literature (see e.g. Li et al. 2000) but they have
the drawback that, in ice-rich soils where ice pressure
is dominant, they lead to very low values of shear
strength at low stresses, against the available experi-
mental evidence. In the formulation by Nishimura et
al. (2009) ice pressure plays the role of the reference
pressure.
Figure 21. Qualitative predictions of constitutive model by Nishi-
mura et al. (2009) on temperature decrease.
As shown in Figure 21, the expansion of the yield
surface when temperature reduces (associated with
78
an increase of suction) involves both enhanced parti-
cle interlocking (expansion towards the right) and ice
strengthening (expansion towards the left). In this
simple way, the combined effects of porosity and ice
strengthening are accounted for. For further details,
the reader is referred to Alonso et al. (1990), Nishi-
mura et al. (2009) and Gens (2010).
6.1 Model calibration from TX test data
To test its predictive capabilities, Casini et al. (2014)
calibrated the parameters of the model described
above against the experimental results of a number of
triaxial tests carried out at different temperatures and
confining stress on samples of Pozzolana retrieved
from the subsoil near the sites of Municipio and To-
ledo Stations. The tests had been carried out by
Tecno-in SpA as part of the geotechnical investiga-
tion for the works of Napoli underground, using a tri-
axial cell working under temperature controlled con-
ditions, described in some detail by Cantone et al.
(2006) and de Sanctis (2007). Both at Municipio and
Toledo, the subsoil consists essentially of made
ground and alluvial and/or in situ pyroclastic sand
(Pozzolana) over the Neapolitan Yellow Tuff, and
the samples were retrieved at depths of about 10 to
11 m b.g.l.. At Municipio this is below the ground-
water table (at about 8.5 m b.g.l.) and therefore the
samples were fully saturated, while at Toledo the
volcanic ashes are above the groundwater table (at
about 21 m b.g.l.) and therefore only partly saturated.
Table 2 summarises the values of average physical
properties of the tested material.
Table 2. Average physical properties of tested volcanic ash.
GS (-) (kN/m3) d (kN/m3) w/c (%) e (-) Sr (%)
2.46 17.32 13.05 36.96 0.90 91.62
Figure 22 summarises the testing conditions of
two triaxial tests (TX1 and TX2) in terms of mean to-
tal stress temperature path, during the freezing
stage, and mean total stress - deviatoric stress path,
during the shearing stage. The main phases of the
tests were: (i) initial drained isotropic compression to
target mean effective stress p' (= 200-350 kPa); (ii)
freezing to target temperature T (= -10C) over a time
of about six hours, followed by an equalization stage
at constant temperature; (iii) shearing at controlled
 Viggiani and Casini

axial displacement rate v (= 0.06 mm/min). During

freezing, obtained by circulating a refrigerating fluid
(glycol) in an inner cylinder surrounding the sample,
the drainage lines were open. However, as the pore
water froze, drainage was progressively inhibited. In
the course of the shearing stage of test TX1, the tem-
perature was increased from -10C to -6C while test
TX2 was sheared to failure at a constant temperature
of -10C.

Figure 23. Results of triaxial compression on frozen samples.

(Farouki 1982, Frivik 1981), in the numerical simula-

tions, average constant values were considered with-
out introducing an error larger than about 9%; the
thermal conductivity of pozzolana was obtained by
back-analysis of the experimental data from the trial
site at Piazza Municipio (de Sanctis 2006).
Figure 22. Paths followed in triaxial tests on frozen samples: (a)
mean total stress, p temperature, T; (b) mean total stress, p de-
viatoric stress, q.

Figure 23 shows the results of the triaxial tests in

terms of deviatoric stress versus axial strain (a:q)
and temperature versus axial strain (a:T). Literature
data (Nicotera 1998, Picarelli et al. 2007) were used
to calibrate the parameters needed to define the
freezing retention curve, the compressibility and its
evolution with suction, and the loading collapse
curve, linking the evolution of the pre-consolidation
stress to suction. The strength of the soil in unfrozen
conditions was obtained from conventional drained
triaxial tests while the remaining parameters of the
mechanical model, namely the shear modulus and
one parameter defining the increase of the intersec-
tion of the yield surface with the isotropic axis with
suction, were obtained by direct calibration against Figure 24. Measured and predicted stress strain behaviour in triax-
the experimental data. ial compression.
The thermal conductivity of the soil depends on
the volume fractions and on the conductivities of the Figure 24 shows a comparison between the ob-
soil mineral phase, the liquid (unfrozen) water phase, served and predicted stress-strain behaviour; the
and, in the case of frozen ground, the ice (solid) wa- agreement between model predictions and experi-
ter phase. Although the thermal conductivities of mental data is satisfactory. The predicted strength of
liquid water and ice depend slightly on temperature the two samples is the same, about 3.5 MPa, irrespec-
tive of the different values of cell pressure, showing

79
Geotechnical Engineering for Infrastructure and Development
that the strength provided by the ice bonding prevails
on that provided by the increasing confining stress.
The mechanical behaviour predicted by the model is
slightly stiffer than observed, and thus the final
strength is reached at strains of the order of 1%,
while in the experiments the maximum deviatoric
strength was attained at axial strains of about 5%.
On the other hand, the softening behaviour on thaw-
ing of sample TX2 is remarkably well reproduced by
the model.
Besides the stress strain behaviour, the model
permits to follow the evolution of the state of the
sample; as an example, Figure 25 shows the predic-
tions of the model in terms of contours of tempera-
ture, T, liquid water pressure, pl, porosity, n, and de-
gree of saturation, Sl, at a specific time (t = 15h)
during the freezing stage of test TX1. The freezing
front advances from the boundary of the sample to-
wards its centre, with a gradient T/x -
1.0/0.019 /m. Due to the decreasing temperature,
the liquid water pressure becomes negative where the
freezing front advances. Also, in the frozen area,
there is a marked increase of porosity induced by
phase transformation (from water to ice) coupled
with the changes of liquid water pressure, and a cor-
responding decrease of liquid water saturation.
(a) (b) (c) (d)
38
sample height (mm)
0 grain crushing, which is particularly important for
19 19 19
sample radius (mm)
Figure 25. Test TX1 predicted contours of: (a) temperature (b)
liquid water pressure (c) porosity, and (c) degree of saturation of
liquid water, during freezing.
6.2 Viscous formulation
The constitutive model described above fails to in-
corporate some important features of the mechanical
behaviour of frozen soils, the most obvious of which
is the characteristic time-dependent behaviour. As a
80
matter of fact, the experimental observations show
that, when a load is applied to frozen soil, this will
respond with an instantaneous deformation and a
time-dependent deformation. This is due to com-
bined mechanical and thermodynamic effects, the
former controlling stress sharing under an increase of
total stress and consolidation, and the latter the pres-
sure melting phenomena, which, under ordinary
stress, would occur mainly locally at grain contacts
(Andersland & Ladanyi 2004). As the water perme-
ability in frozen soils is very small, although frozen
soil undergoes consolidation, eventually leading to
transfer of applied stress to the grain structure, the
time required for consolidation is extremely long,
and therefore the majority of tests on frozen ground
reported in the literature should be classified as un-
drained.
Because the loads applied to the frozen ground are
shared between the soil skeleton and the pore ice, the
time-dependent behaviour of frozen ground is con-
trolled by the time-dependent behaviour of the two
components. Ice displays a wide range of mechani-
cal properties, including elasticity, visco-elasticity,
visco-plasticity, creep rupture and brittle failure
(Schulson & Duval 2009); in glaciers and ice sheets,
ice is commonly treated as a non linear viscous fluid.
The results of creep tests on ice indicate that stress
level, temperature, grain size and growth, re-
crystallization, and the presence of particles and im-
purities all play a role in its time-dependent behav-
iour. On the other hand, the available experimental
evidence on time-dependent behaviour of sands, ob-
tained mainly by one-dimensional compression tests,
indicate that significant secondary compression oc-
curs under maintained loading. This behaviour is re-
lated not only to particle rearrangement but also to
19 sands and soft rocks of pyroclastic origin, such as the
pozzolanas and tuff in the subsoil of Napoli, charac-
terised by high values of the coefficient of secondary
compression, and increasing with increasing stress
level (Evangelista & Aversa 1994). Strain rate ef-
fects on the stiffness and strength of sands and soft
rocks have also been observed in triaxial compres-
sion (see e.g. Tatsuoka et al. 2000).
The constitutive relations by Nishimura et al.
(2009) described above were implemented in the vis-
co-plastic form proposed by Perzyna (1966). The to-
 Viggiani and Casini

tal strain rate, is the sum of the elastic and visco-
plastic strain rate:
e vp (1)
in which the visco-plastic strain rate is expressed as:
F mm/min and values of N = 3 and F0 = 1 MPa based
vp ( F ) (2)
where is referred to as the fluidity parameter, with
units of inverse of time, and denotes the relative rate
of visco-plastic strain. The scalar flow function
increases monotonically with F and defines the cur-
rent magnitude of the visco-plastic strain rate; this is
expressed with argument F, which is the yield func-
tion with associative plasticity. The adopted form of
the flow function is:
N
F formulation of the model can capture the dependency
( F )
(3)
F0
where exponent N is a material parameter and F0 is a
normalizing constant with the same units as those of
F.
model the time dependent behaviour of frozen soils,
and the role played by temperature may be accounted
for by introducing the dependency of fluidity on suc-
tion (Alonso et al. 2005).
The numerical predictions reported in the previous
section were obtained with a loading rate of 0.06
on literature data (Sayles 1968, Morgenstern et al.
1980). Due to the lack of experimental data to cali-
brate the model adequately, the dependency of fluidi-
ty on suction was neglected, and a constant value of
= 10-7 s-1 was assumed.
Figure 26 shows the predictions of the model for
test TX1 with three axial displacement rates
(v = 0.006, 0.06 and 0.6 mm/min); in the same figure,
results are also reported for three different tempera-
tures (T = -2C, -6C, and -10C). It is clear that,
even in this relatively crude form, the visco-plastic
of strength on strain rate, and that the results of the
numerical simulations given in Figure 27 in terms of
strength versus axial strain rate resemble very closely
the results reported by Bragg and Andersland (1982)
for a frozen sand. A better designed experimental
campaign, using new equipment (see below),
should permit to calibrate better the dependency of
fluidity on suction and, hence, on temperature.

Figure 26. Test TX1: predicted stress-strain behaviour with differ-

ent values of axial displacement rate and temperature.

Although visco-plasticity was implemented with

the main aim of regularising integration of the elasto- Figure 27. Model predictions: shear strength dependency on tem-
plastic material law on softening (Zienkiewicz & perature and axial displacement rate.
Taylor 2000, Conti et al. 2013), this can be useful to

81
Geotechnical Engineering for Infrastructure and Development

7 THAW BEHAVIOUR from Municipio site at depths of 11 m b.g.l. and

22 m b.g.l., respectively, were sent to UPC, Barcelo-
Volume change of thawing soil results from both na. Two tests were carried out for each material, fol-
phase change (ice to water) and flow of excess water lowing the stress paths shown in Figure 28.
out of the soil; drainage of the thawed soil leads to
additional volume change, the amount of which de-
pends on consolidation and soil structural changes
that may have occurred during the freezing cycle. A
variety of factors such as stress level, amplitude of
the thermal cycle, and history of moisture changes af-
fect the amount and distribution of ice in frozen
ground (Andersland & Ladanyi 2004), and hence the
settlements exhibited on thawing.
In very general terms, on freezing, the ice content
and the suction increase and the frozen soil swells
due to the decrease of effective stress acting on the
soil skeleton and to the phase change of water; on the
other hand, on thawing, as the ice content and the
suction decrease with increasing temperature, the ef-
fective stress in the soil skeleton must go back to bal-
ance the given overburden stress, and the voids ratio
of the soil will decrease. Plastic deformation within
the main yield locus and structural degradation in- Figure 28. Paths followed in oedometer tests on pozzolana and
tuff in terms of vertical stress temperature.
duced by swelling on freezing may give rise to cumu-
lated changes of voids ratio on cycles of freezing and After about 6-hour saturation under a back pres-
thawing. sure of 10 kPa, the samples were incrementally load-
The experience on Napoli underground was that ed to a target vertical stress representative of the in
large thaw settlements were systematically recorded
situ conditions, vmax = 200 kPa and 500 kPa for poz-
at all sites, in many cases larger than the heave rec-
zolana, and vmax = 500 kPa and 800 kPa for tuff. A
orded during the freezing stages. However, artificial
temperature cycle of freezing and thawing with an
ground freezing was typically switched off after tun-
amplitude of +22C to -20C was then applied in
nel excavation and installation of the permanent lin-
steps of 5C/6 hours, at constant vertical stress. The
ing, also contributing to the overall measured settle-
samples were maintained at the minimum tempera-
ment at surface, so that it was not always easy to
ture of -20C for 48 hours, whilst monitoring the dis-
distinguish between the different sources of ground
placement of the top of the sample. Finally, after
settlement. The indication coming from the early ap-
thawing, the samples were incrementally unloaded
plications of AGF on Line 1 was that volcanic soils,
and dismantled.
such as pozzolana and tuff, may be particularly prone
Figure 29 shows the results of the four tests in the
to large thaw settlements, and, at a later stage in the
project, it had become customary to associate prelim- e-log(v) plane. The voids ratio changes in the ther-
inary ground treatment with chemical and grout in- mal cycle are larger for pozzolana than for tuff, but
jections to artificial ground freezing of pozzolana. for both materials the change of voids ratio after
To get a better understanding of thaw behaviour of freezing and thawing decreases with increasing verti-
pozzolana and tuff, a preliminary experimental inves- cal stress. Further testing at different values of verti-
tigation was carried out (Pelez et al. 2014) using cal stress and temperature are planned in the future.
two oedometer cells that were modified to work at Figure 30 compares the predictions of the THM
temperatures below 0C (Pelez 2013). Two undis- model and the experimental data obtained for pozzo-
turbed core samples of pozzolana and tuff, retrieved lana. The agreement between model predictions and
observed behaviour is satisfactory; as in the expe

82

Figure 29. Oedometer test results: (a) tuff; (b) pozzolana.
rimental data, the model predicts a larger cumulated
change of voids ratio after the thermal cycle at lower
vertical stress. In the model, the cumulated changes
of voids ratio are connected to the negative hardening
of the yield surface on freezing: the plastic volumet-
ric strains on freezing are negative (dilative) and
therefore the size of the yield locus decreases.
Even if preliminary, the experimental data seem to
indicate that the observed cumulated change of voids
ratio is larger than predicted by the model with a rea-
sonable set of parameters. This may be due to micro-
structural changes induced by freezing and thawing.
To test this hypothesis, the results of Mercury In-
trusion Porosimetry (MIP) on natural samples of tuff
and those obtained on samples that had been subject-
ed to freezing to -10C at a vertical effective stress of
50 kPa are compared in Figure 31, together with
those obtained for two samples of pozzolana which
were taken to -20C at two different values of verti-
cal effective stress. The results are reported in
Viggiani and Casini
Figure 30. Pozzolana: comparison between oedometer test results
and model predictions.
Figure 31. Results of MIP tests on tuff and pozzolana.
terms of voids ratio of the non-wetting fluid, in this
case mercury vs. pore entrance diameter. The results
for Pozzolana indicate a reduction of the macro pores
on increasing vertical stress at the same minimum
temperature (T = -20C), while those on Yellow Tuff,
for a maximum vertical stress of 500 kPa and a min-
imum temperature of -10C, point to a reduction and
a shift to smaller diameters of the macro-porosity and
an increase in micro-porosity relative to the intact
material. These preliminary results show that the
freezing process has relevant effects of on the macro-
porosity and hence on the microstructure of the mate-
rial.
83
Geotechnical Engineering for Infrastructure and Development
8 EQUIPMENT DEVELOPMENT
Because testing of frozen soil is non-conventional,
any fundamental research in the behaviour of frozen
soils involves a certain amount of equipment devel-
opment.
The triaxial tests discussed above were carried out
in a double-walled triaxial cell working under tem-
perature controlled conditions, which was originally
developed by Tecno-in SpA, and has been described
in some detail by Cantone et al. (2006) and de Sanc-
tis (2007). The cell fluid (glycol), which also acts as
the refrigerating medium, is circulated in an inner
cylinder containing the sample, while the outer cyl-
inder is kept under vacuum to limit condensation.
The loading ram moves vertically in a sleeve seal,
which is connected to an LVDT for the measurement
of vertical displacements. The axial load is measured
using an external load cell fixed under the cross bar
of the loading frame. Tests are generally performed
at controlled displacement rate. There are three in-
dependent pressure circuits, one controlling the cell
pressure and two controlling the pore water pressure
in the sample. A probe placed in the middle of the
samples monitors its temperature. Despite its many
advantages, in its present configuration, this piece of
equipment has several limitations. For instance, as
during the freezing stages the water in the drainage
lines freezes, it is impossible to measure the volume
changes using the external volume gauge and, contra-
ry to the site conditions, freezing proceeds from the
outer boundary of the sample towards its centre. At
present, to overcome these limitations, modifications
to the apparatus are under design and funding has
been requested to build and set up a prototype stress-
path-controlled triaxial system for frozen soils.
Other triaxial apparatuses for tests on frozen soils
have been developed in different research institu-
tions. For instance, a triaxial apparatus was designed
at IGT-ETHZ, originally to carry out creep tests on
snow (Von Moos 2001, von Moos et al. 2003), and
then modified for stress path testing of frozen soils
(Arenson & Springman 2005, Yamamoto & Spring-
man 2014). Despite the fact that it is possible to car-
ry out stress path testing, the equipment shares some
of the drawbacks of the Tecno-in cell: freezing pro-
ceeds from the outside of the sample towards its cen-
tre and, again, the refrigerating medium in the exter-
84
nal cell is used to measure the volume changes of the
sample which is not accurate.
Often the modifications to existing equipment are
not very expensive, only they require a certain
amount of experimental creativity and care to details.
The two oedometer cells that were used at UPC to
explore the thaw behaviour of pozzolana and tuff are
existing suction controlled oedometer cells (Romero
1999) which were immersed in a thermal bath, in
which a refrigerating fluid was circulated at con-
trolled temperature between +30C and -30C. The
temperature of the refrigerating fluid, which was a
50/50 mixture of water and ethylene glycol, was con-
trolled using a thermostat immersed in the thermal
bath, and the temperature in the sample was meas-
ured using thermocouples. Water drainage was al-
lowed through the bottom and this is connected to a
reservoir (Pelaez et al. 2014, Pelaez 2013). The ver-
tical stress was applied through compressed air at the
top of the sample and it was regulated in steps. Alt-
hough this may seem relatively simple, there were a
large number of sub-experimental problems connect-
ed to the high thermal conductivity of the metal parts
of the oedometer, such as the brass piston rod and
guiding pin of the top membrane, which meant that
ice would form around the top of the oedometer and
block both the cell itself and the LVDT that was
meant to measure the vertical displacements of the
sample, see Figure 32. The problem was solved
changing many metal parts of the odometer cells
with specially manufactured PVC parts, as shown in
Figure 33.
Figure 32. Picture showing ice forming around the top of the mod-
ified oedometer.

Figure 33. Picture showing modified oedometer with piston rod
and guiding pin of the top membrane manufactured in PVC.
Promising developments come from innovative
techniques such as Frequency Domain Reflectometry
(FDR). The ice retention model has recently been
explored experimentally measuring the temperature
and the degree of liquid saturation during freezing of
samples of pozzolana (Pelaez 2015). A commercial
FDR device (see Figure 34), including both bulk
electrical conductivity and temperature sensors was
used in connection with three additional thermocou-
ples at different heights in the sample. Such methods
are based on the propagation characteristics of elec-
tromagnetic waves and electric/dielectric properties
of the soils, which change with changing liquid water
content and salinity. The technique was calibrated at
different target temperatures on saturated pozzolana
and on another saturated sand, showing encouraging
results to determine experimentally the ice retention
properties at different temperatures and during freez-
ing at different rates.
Figure 34. FDR device including both bulk electrical conductivity
and temperature sensors.
Viggiani and Casini
Another potentially very interesting tool to determine
experimentally the freezing retention curve of soils is
represented by the application of Electrical Resistivi-
ty Tomography (ERT), which has been applied re-
cently in the laboratory to monitor the local water
content changes during transient wetting processes in
sands and silts (Cosentini et al., 2012). In this meth-
od, an electrical current is applied to the soil by two
electrodes, and the induced electrical potential differ-
ence is measured across other pairs of electrodes.
Since the collected measurements are linked to the
conductivity of the soil by known physical laws, it is
possible to estimate the distribution of conductivity
within the sample by solving an inverse problem
(Comina et al. 2008), although the inversion and in-
terpretation of ERT data from ice-rich samples are
challenging due to strong resistivity contrasts and
high contact resistances. In perspective, the same
method could be applied at field scale, to monitor the
propagation of the freezing front during engineering
applications of AGF.
9 TOLEDO STATION
Toledo station is inserted in such a densely built en-
vironment that it was not possible to use the same
layout adopted for the other four stations of this part
of the line. In this case, the only available space to
locate the vertical access shaft between the existing
buildings was on a side of the running tunnels, Fig-
ure 35(a); from the vertical shaft a large service tun-
nel gives access to the four platform tunnels and two
pedestrian passageways, Figure 35(b). The service
tunnel has a maximum height of 17 m, a width of
14 m, a length of 40 m, for a total volume of exca-
vated soil of about 8 000 m3 (see Figure 36). The
soil profile consists of made ground followed by a
small layer of Neapolitan Pyroclastic Pile (6.4 m), al-
luvial and/or in situ pyroclastic sand (pozzolana), for
a thickness of about 23.5 m and then Neapolitan Yel-
low Tuff. The crown of the service tunnel is mostly
contained in pozzolana, while the bench and invert
were to be excavated in tuff; the pore water pressures
are hydrostatic with a piezometric head of 4.7 m a.s.l.
(or 22.3 m b.g.l.). Excavation was carried out with
the aid of AGF at the crown, for both stability and
85
Geotechnical Engineering for Infrastructure and Development

arch maintained with brine until the excavation of the

crown and the bench had been completed in February
2007. The service tunnel was constructed by sequen-
tial excavation. The crown section, with a height of
6 m, of which about one half pozzolana and one half
in tuff, was excavated first, in steps advancing 4 m,
for each of which excavation was followed by cast-
ing of the first concrete lining with a thickness of
0.75 m. After completing the crown, 7.5 m of the
bench section, completely contained in tuff, were ex-
cavated and the first lining cast following a similar
schedule as for the crown. Excavation of the bottom
part of the bench and of the invert started concurrent-
ly with de-activation of freezing in February 2007.
After opening the connections to the four platform
tunnels and the two pedestrian passageways through
(a)
the service tunnel lining, the structure of the service
tunnel was completed by casting another concrete
layer, 0.8 m-thick and separated by the first lining by
a waterproofing layer.

(b)
Figure 35. Toledo Station: plan (a) and section through vertical
shaft.

waterproofing purposes, and cement and chemical

grouting at the sidewalls and at the invert, using mul-
ti-packer sleeved pipes, mostly to prevent access of
water through the system of scarpine. The freeze
tubes were inserted around the tunnel crown horizon-
tally from the access shaft and sub-vertically from a
pilot service tunnel located about 10 m above the
crown, that is just above the water table. From the
vertical access shaft a jet-grouted plug section was
created at the end of the service tunnel.
Figure 36. Toledo Station: section through service tunnel.
Artificial ground freezing was activated with ni-
trogen at the end of June 2006; after about 10 days,
the system was changed to brine and then the frozen

86

Figure 37. Toledo Station: settlements measured during station
construction with indication of construction phases of service tun-
nel.
During the entire duration of the works, tempera-
tures in the ground were measured using thermocou-
ples installed in observation holes; at the same time,
the surface vertical displacements of a number of sur-
face reference points were monitored by precision
levelling and the piezometric level in the area were
measured by piezometers installed at different
depths.
Figure 37 shows the settlements of some of the
reference points during construction of the station to-
gether with the main ground treatment (injections,
freezing, and thawing) and excavation phases (pilot,
crown, bench, invert), while Figure 38 shows the
contours of the final settlements, after completion of
the station. The final maximum settlement at the mid
section of the service tunnel (reference point 146),
was about 90 mm; of these about one third were due
to construction of the service tunnel. Excavation of
the pilot service tunnel in conventional mining
caused about 10 mm settlement, cement and chemi-
cal grouting were responsible for another 5 mm,
which were completely recovered during activation
of freezing with nitrogen, about 8 mm were due to
the excavation of the crown under AGF, while only
about 4 mm to the excavation of the bench and invert
in tuff. Finally, after switching off AGF, about
12 mm settlements were recorded on thawing. Simi-
lar to the experience in Municipio, surface settle-
ments were accompanied by groundwater lowering
during the execution of the works.
Several attempts to analyse the observed behav-
iour have been conducted by different Authors. Ca-
vuoto et al. (2006) carried out 2D finite element
Viggiani and Casini
analyses to evaluate the state of stress in the frozen
arch protecting excavation of the crown; Russo et al.
(2015a, 2015b) carried out 3D finite difference ana-
Figure 38. Toledo Station: plan (a) and section (b) through vertical
shaft.
lyses of the service tunnel excavation to assess its
impact on existing structures and services. In the lat-
ter case, both pozzolana and tuff were modelled as
elastic perfectly plastic with Mohr-Coulomb failure
criterion and non associated flow.
The actual sequence of construction stages was
simulated in the model, in drained analyses including
excavation of the pilot service tunnel and ground
treatment. The mechanical parameters of frozen and
thawed pozzolana were obtained in part from the re-
sults of laboratory tests carried out on frozen and
thawed samples, and in part by back analysis of the
monitored displacements. The overall agreement of
the results of the numerical model with the observed
settlements was satisfactory, even if the extension of
the computed surface settlement trough was wider
than observed, and the model failed to capture the de-
tails of ground movements during the freezing and
thawing stages.
To get a better understanding of the coupled phe-
nomena taking place around the tunnel in the frozen
area, more recently, an attempt to back analyse the
87
Geotechnical Engineering for Infrastructure and Development

ground temperatures and surface displacements dur-
ing construction of the service tunnel has been car-
ried out by Casini (2015) using the coupled THM
formulation by Nishimura et al. (2009).
ferent stages considered in the analysis, from activa-
tion of AGF with nitrogen to thawing.
Finally, Figure 41 shows the predicted displace-
ments at surface together with those measured on
reference point 146.

Figure 40. Toledo Station: measured and predicted temperatures at

Figure 39. Toledo Station: layout of analysed section showing po- secondary hole TF2.
sition of freezing holes and secondary hole TF2.

These analyses, still in progress, are carried out in

plane strain conditions due to the computational costs
of running fully coupled 3D analyses. The simula-
tions are representative of the middle section of the
cross tunnel; because of symmetry only half of the
problem is included in the finite element mesh, which
is 65 m and 75 m deep, including an upper layer of
Pozzolana with a thickness of 35 m and a bottom
layer of tuff with a thickness of 40 m. The tempera-
ture changes induced during nitrogen activation,
brine maintenance and thawing are applied as bound-
ary conditions on sub-vertical lines representing the
freezing holes installed from the pilot service tunnel
and on a series of points corresponding to the posi-
tions of the horizontal freezing holes installed from
the shaft (see Figure 39). Figure 41. Toledo Station: measured and predicted surface dis-
An example of the results of the numerical anal- placement at monitoring point 146.
yses is given in Figure 40 where the values of tem-
perature measured along secondary hole TF2, located The predictions were corrected to take into ac-
1.47 m directly above the crown, at various distances count the fact that the analyses are conducted in
from the vertical access shaft are compared with the plane strain, using the results from parallel 2D anal-
model predictions in the mid-section of the service yses carried out in the longitudinal section of the tun-
tunnel. The comparison is satisfactory for all the dif- nel. Although more work is required to fine-tune the
results, this preliminary comparison is very encour-

88

aging, as it shows that the model is capable of captur-
ing at least the quality of surface displacements dur-
ing all phases of construction included in the simula-
tion (nitrogen activation of freezing and maintenance
with brine, excavation and thawing).
10 SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS
The starting point of this paper was the description of
an extensive and successful application of the tech-
nique of AGF to ensure stability and to control
ground water flow during excavation of some of the
stations of Line 1 of Napoli Underground through
loose granular soils and a fractured soft rock. Con-
struction was accompanied by an intense programme
of monitoring designed to measure and control the
effects on adjacent structures, which, for its extension
and completeness, represented a unique opportunity
to collect field data on the performance of AGF.
To reduce the time required for the formation of
the frozen collar while containing the maintenance
costs, in this application, AGF was typically activat-
ed with nitrogen and maintained with brine; the
ground freezing procedures were optimised by means
of field trials and parallel numerical and theoretical
analyses.
Directional drilling of freeze and secondary tubes
and accurate surveying of their alignment proved to
be crucial as well as the development of appropriate
data reduction techniques permitting timely control
of the growth of the frozen body. In the early appli-
cations, such as in Garibaldi Station, prolonged freez-
ing due to the delayed response of some of the ther-
mocouples affected adversely the retaining structures
of the station box, with an increase of the horizontal
displacements of the diaphragm wall and of the loads
in the anchors.
Significant thaw settlements were systematically
observed at all sites, in many cases larger than the
heave recorded during the freezing stages. As tunnel
excavation and seepage through imperfections in the
frozen barrier and the permanent lining also contrib-
ute to the overall measured settlement at surface, it is
not always easy to distinguish between the different
sources of ground settlement. As a matter of fact, in
many cases, surface settlements during excavation
under AGF protection were accompanied by signifi-
Viggiani and Casini
cant reductions of the recorded water head, probably
due to incomplete or delayed closure of the frozen
barrier due to excessive water seepage. Although in
principle the problem may be tackled by coupled
thermo-hydraulic analyses, in practice the imperfec-
tions in the frozen barrier are mostly connected to
high water seepage velocities in the system of ran-
domly distributed sub-vertical fractures in the tuff,
whose location is unknown before the execution of
the works. This makes it difficult to carry out truly
predictive calculations and suggests the implementa-
tion of an observational approach relying on the sys-
tematic measurement of piezometric head and tem-
peratures in the ground, with localised nitrogen re-
activation in the most severe cases of incomplete or
inadequate formation of the frozen wall, such as e.g.
at Municipio.
Additional settlements on thawing may result from
volume changes associated to the phase change of ice
to water and flow of excess water out of the soil, the
amount of which depends on consolidation and soil
structural changes that may have occurred during the
freezing cycle. The indication coming from the ap-
plications of ground freezing on Napoli is that vol-
canic soils such as pozzolana and tuff may be par-
ticularly prone to large thaw settlements.
The paper has documented some of the back-
analyses and interpretations of different aspects of
the AGF process that were carried out right from the
beginning of the project with varying degrees of so-
phistication, depending on their particular application
purpose. These included de-coupled heat propaga-
tion analyses carried out in parametric studies intend-
ed to evaluate the time needed to achieve the design
temperatures in the ground and optimise the process,
and finite element back analyses of the observed sur-
face heave and settlements in which freezing and
thawing and the mechanical interaction between the
frozen ring and the surrounding soil were modelled
separately, assigning strength and stiffness parame-
ters to the frozen ground determined by ad-hoc la-
boratory tests carried out under temperature con-
trolled conditions.
More recently, a research project bringing together
constitutive modelling, laboratory tests and field data
was started as an international co-operation involving
UPC Barcelona, Universit di Roma Tor Vergata,
Seconda Universit di Napoli, and technical person-
89
Geotechnical Engineering for Infrastructure and Development
nel and engineers involved in the design and con-
struction of Napoli underground. The paper has il-
lustrated some of the work carried out in the context
of this project. A two-stress-variable model for fully
coupled termo-hydro-mechanical analyses of frozen
ground, developed using the analogy between the
physics of frozen-saturated and unfrozen-unsaturated
soils, has been calibrated against the results of la-
boratory tests carried out under temperature con-
trolled conditions and is currently being used to
back-analyse the behaviour observed in situ. Alt-
hough the model is able to capture the main features
of the behaviour of frozen soils, it has limitations in
describing some aspects of the observed behaviour,
such as strain-rate-dependency and the response to
freeze thaw cycles.
Possible enhancements to the model include the
development of a viscous formulation, in which the
role played by temperature may be accounted for by
introducing the dependency of fluidity on suction, the
occurrence of plastic deformation inside the main
yield locus, and the effects of de-structuring.
To get a better understanding of the thaw behav-
iour of pozzolana and tuff, a preliminary experi-
mental investigation was carried out using two oe-
dometer cells that were modified to work at
temperatures below 0C, together with MIP investi-
gations of micro-structural changes induced by freez-
ing and thawing cycles and mechanical loading; at
the same time, new equipment and testing procedures
are being developed to carry out an extended experi-
mental campaign on the mechanical behaviour of
frozen/unfrozen pozzolana and tuff.
Ultimately, the project should provide insight into
the mechanical behaviour of artificially frozen vol-
canic soils, relying on the contributions of different
areas of expertise such as continuum mechanics, con-
stitutive modelling, laboratory testing and site moni-
toring. The final goal of the research is to be able to
model the construction process accurately, thus gain-
ing confidence in the design of similar works from
the engineering point of view.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The generous technical support of several people as
well as their permission to publish research results,
90
are gratefully acknowledged: Alessandro Mandolini,
Luca de Sanctis, Filippo "Iceman" Cavuoto, Andrea
Corbo, Lucio Amato, Antonio Gens, Enrique
Romero, Sebastia Olivella, Ronny Pelaez. The sec-
ond Author was supported financially by the Europe-
an Commission through the Marie Curie Intra Euro-
pean Fellowship (EU FP7-NuMAGF, grant
agreement 272073).
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