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Evaluation of Long-Term Performance of Transportation Earthworks Prone to Weather-Driven Deterioration Under Changing Climate
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2025-04-01
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[PDF-6.87 MB]
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Edition:Final Report
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Abstract:Embankments are key transportation infrastructure features providing essential support for long, linear stretches of transportation infrastructure, including highways and railways, in California and globally. Clay embankments are susceptible to weather-related deterioration processes that can gradually compromise their stability and, in some cases, lead to unexpected failures. Climate change, along with the associated shifts in weather patterns, is projected to adversely impact weather-related deterioration processes, leading to exacerbated failures and/or shorter service life. This study evaluated the impact of climate change on the rate of weather-driven deterioration of embankments in two locations in California: Los Angeles and Sacramento. Specifically, a multi-phase hydromechanical geotechnical model was developed for an exemplar clay embankment. The model is capable of simulating long-term performance of an embankment subject to a climate-controlled flux boundary. The model was used to perform numerical simulations where temperature and rainfall levels were adjusted to reflect four possible future climate change scenarios: Case (1) no average temperature or average precipitation changes; Case (2) +3℃ average temperature change and –12.5% average precipitation change; Case (3) +3℃average temperature change and no average precipitation change; and Case (4) +3℃ average temperature change and +12.5% average precipitation change. Performance indicators were obtained from the numerical simulations to compare the effect of climate change in Los Angeles and Sacramento. It was concluded that climate change is generally projected to adversely affect the long-term performance of clay embankments, which can put critical transportation infrastructure and the communities that depend on it at risk.
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