ABSTRACT
The Department of Structures and Materials, China Institute of Water Resources and Hydropower Research (IWHR), has been engaged in the field of thermal control of mass concrete for many years and has developed the systematic methodology for thermal control in the course of undertaking systematic researches on the thermal control of many Chinese dams of fame in the world. One software package for simulating analysis of concrete hydraulic structures has also been successfully developed. The software package is provided with full functions for simulation and can be used for gravity dams and arch dams built of conventional concrete and/or RCC as well as concrete faced rock fill dams (CFRD). The special thermal problems related to some particular locations such as steep slopes, concrete backfill and dam heightening are also given good treatment. The boundary conditions, including climate, hydrology, surface protection, overflowing during construction and reservoir impoundment, of the whole life cycle of the dam from the construction till the end of operation, and the internal conditions, including the time dependent change in the properties of the concrete and water pipe cooling, can be simulated very well in the computation of the time dependent stress and deformation at all locations of the structures. After careful comparison of many computational cases in combination with feedbacks from the project, proper measures for cracking control can be proposed in the end.
In this paper the methodology for thermal control and the software package developed by the authors are introduced. A typical RCC gravity dam is cited to illustrate the use of the software in details.
