Faculty Publications
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Item A review on stability analysis of coal mine dumps(Inderscience Publishers, 2024) Harish, P.; Chandar, K.R.Opencast mines are increasingly extracting deeper coal seams in large quantities, leading to a rise in mine depth and generation of substantial waste. Disposal of this waste becomes challenging due to the need for additional land, resulting in dumping excess waste on existing dumps, posing risks of dump failure, property damage, and loss of life. This paper aims the critical review of the stability of dump slope structures that are present on the weak or disturbed foundations which further leads the dumps to fail. Many researchers have concentrated on the irregular base, loose material presence in the foundation, sloping floors, improper compaction at the foundation level, presence of black cotton soil, etc., stating load of the dumps over the weaker foundations exerts more pressure on the foundation and causing the dumps to fail. It synthesises key findings on stability analysis approaches, design criteria, optimisation techniques, and critical parameters involved in numerical modelling-based design for secure dump slope structures. © © 2024 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd.Item Slope stabilization of coal mine overburden dumps: life cycle environmental sustainability assessment of alternatives(Springer Science and Business Media Deutschland GmbH, 2024) Kumar, A.; Nainegali, L.; Das, S.K.; Reddy, K.R.; Mishra, A.The stability of coalmine overburden dumps is a crucial aspect and often requires a slope stabilization method in place to prevent slope failures. Mechanical methods like benching, gabion wall construction, geogrid reinforcement, and biological methods like the use of vegetation can suffice the need for slope stabilization. In this study, a life cycle assessment of the above-mentioned methods was performed to obtain the environmental impacts through various midpoint impact categories considering a “cradle-to-site” assessment. The system boundary for each method was created using the involved activities and associated equipment and energy needs. The Ecoinvent 3.0 database and TRACI assessment method were used to perform the life cycle impact assessment using SimaPro software. The results show that the use of vegetation caused the least impact. The highest impact under the majority midpoint categories was caused by geogrid reinforcement followed by benching, which was mostly attributed to the geogrid production and OB handling activities, respectively. The carcinogenic, followed by ecotoxicity and fossil fuel depletions, were the most impacted categories for the mechanical methods, which may be due to the release of chemical pollutants during material production or handling. Adherence to the overburden dump management guidelines and the use of renewable sources of energy are the two major aspects that can drastically curb the emission load on the environment, thus inching towards the goal of sustainability while adopting slope stabilization measures for overburden dumps. Besides imparting stability, plants provide a diverse solution to the other ills associated with the overburden storage and management. © The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2024.Item Stability Analysis of Overburden Dumps over Old Underground Workings Using Artificial Neural Networks(Pleiades Publishing, 2024) Harish, P.; Chandar, K.R.Abstract: Stability of overburden dump slopes is a crucial aspect in designing secure and cost-effective dumps. The Strength Reduction Factor (SRF) serves as a widely used term to assess dump stability. This paper focuses on developing an Artificial Neural Network (ANN) model capable of predicting SRF for overburden dumps situated above existing underground workings. To construct the model, a dataset comprising 96 numerical simulations of overburden dumps generated through the finite element method was utilized. A neural network architecture with three layers of forward-backward propagation was utilized, containing hidden neurons to analyze simulations during training, validation and testing stages. The input parameters for studying overburden dump slopes over underground workings included dump slope height (Sh), dump slope angle (), cohesion (C), friction angle (Ø), unit weight () of the dump material, depth of working from the surface (D), centre-to-centre pillar distance in underground workings (C-C), and gallery width (Gw). The ANN predicted results were compared with the outcomes derived from numerical simulations of overburden dump slopes above underground workings. The study highlights that the developed ANN model in this research proves highly effective in handling and designing complex overburden dump slopes. The obtained results indicate a Mean Square Error (MSE) of 0.0595 and a coefficient of determination (R) of 0.883, both of which are considered acceptable. © Pleiades Publishing, Ltd. 2024.Item Root reinforcement of herbaceous vegetation for stabilization of coal mine overburden dump slopes(Springer Science and Business Media Deutschland GmbH, 2025) Kumar, A.; Nainegali, L.; Das, S.K.; Reddy, K.R.Slope instability of coal mine overburden dumps poses significant challenges to mining safety and environmental sustainability. This study investigates the potential for root reinforcement offered by herbaceous vegetation (Dendrocalamus strictus and Cymbopogon citratus) for enhanced slope stability. A series of pot experiments were conducted to grow grasses with the coal mine overburden material. The survival and growth of grasses in the nutrient-devoid overburden are critical because they directly impact the effectiveness of root reinforcement. Therefore, the effect of amendment quantity on plant growth was assessed. A direct shear box test was conducted on the bare and rooted samples using a fabricated internal shear test assembly to determine the strength. The higher peak shear stress and dilatancy angle observed for the rooted specimens were due to the high root tensile strength mobilizing the shear stresses. The results of shear tests were subsequently employed in limit equilibrium slope stability analyses where material heterogeneity was considered to account for uncertainties linked to material properties. The deterministic analysis provided insights into the expected improvements in slope stability due to root reinforcement, offering a baseline for comparison. Meanwhile, the probabilistic analysis considered the variability in material properties, thus providing a more comprehensive understanding of the uncertainty associated with the slope stability assessment regarding the reliability index and probability of failure. By combining experimental investigations with rigorous analytical approaches, this study enhances our understanding of how grassroots reinforcement can enhance the stability of coal mine overburden dumps. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2025.