J. Saveur (ed.) (Re)Claiming the Underground Space, ITA, Amsterdam, 2003, pp. 759–765.

Influence of excess pore pressures on the stability of the tunnel face

W. Broere
A. Broere’s Aannemingsmij. BV, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Geotechnical Laboratory, Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands

ABSTRACT: In shield tunnelling in loose and water bearing soils, a bentonite slurry is often used to help support
the tunnel face. During excavation, the bentonite cake, which is intended to seal the face, is removed by the cutter
bits and subsequently slurry will infiltrate the soil. This infiltration causes excess pore pressures in front of the
TBM, which lower the stability of the face. The effect has been investigated using a stationary model as well as
with a time-dependent groundwater flow model, linked to a limit equilibrium face stability model. This model
can be used to predict the minimal required support pressure and also the build-up of excess pore pressures in
front of the TBM over time. The calculated excess pore pressures compare well with field observations.

1 INTRODUCTION earth-pressure balance (EPB) shield, as other tech-

The use of tunnel boring machines to realise under-
ground works is still continuously extended to condi-
tions that were, until recently, deemed too difficult to
work in. A list of examples can be found in the Neth-
erlands alone, such as the tunnel beneath the Green
Heart, part of the High Speed Link South from Ams-
terdam to Brussel. This almost 15 m diameter tunnel
is constructed in part in loose sand layers with a high,
confined, water table, below a thick stratum of ex-
tremely soft peats and clays. The soil conditions can
only be characterised as difficult and extremely sens-
itive to settlements. Yet due to the presence of several
roads, railroads, dikes and pipe infrastructure at the
surface, the allowable surface settlements are limited
to only 10 mm in some locations.
Another example is the proposed construction of the
North-South light rail link in Amsterdam, where a twin
tunnel will be constructed in the vicinity of the old
wooden pile foundations supporting the historic build-
ings of the inner city. In these conditions the accept-
able deformations of the subsoil are even more lim-
ited, to avoid damage to the highly sensitive masonry
structures. For such projects, a reliable prediction of
the required support pressure and, subsequently, a re-
liable control of the pressure at the tunnel face, is of
utmost importance.
2 SUPPORT PRESSURE CALCULATION
The most common tunnel boring techniques used in
soft, water bearing soils are the slurry shield and the
niques fail to meet the rigorous settlement criteria out-
lined above.
In a slurry shield a pressurised slurry is used to
stabilise the tunnel face, often combined with an air
bubble in the pressure chamber to limit pressure fluc-
tuations. This bentonite slurry is normally injected
into the working chamber at a pressure higher than the
pore water pressure in the soil. Due to the pressure
difference the slurry will infiltrate the soil and form a
filter cake at the face (Krause 1987). This filter cake
will then seal the face, help to transfer the slurry pres-
sure onto the soil skeleton and protect against micro-
collapses at the face. Numerous models used to de-
termine the minimal required support pressure at the
face implicitly assume this filter cake to be a thin and
perfectly impermeable membrane, so that no slurry in-
filtrates the soil, e.g. the models by Jancsecz & Steiner
(1994), Leca & Dormieux (1990) or Murayama, see
(Kanayasu et al. 1995).
Anagnostou & Kovári (1994) noticed that during
stand-still of the TBM the slurry will infiltrate the soil
and the filter cake is no longer a thin membrane. In
coarse sands and gravels, the infiltration length of the
slurry can reach several decimeters. The support pres-
sure is no longer transferred to the soil at the tunnel
face, but gradually over this infiltration zone. The res-
ult is a reduced efficiency of the slurry in stabilising
the face, which may lead to collapse of the face in very
coarse soils.
This infiltration occurs not only during stand-still,
but also during the actual excavation process. As
the cutter bits constantly remove the established filter
cake, there is also a continuous infiltration of slurry

1
 J. Saveur (ed.) (Re)Claiming the Underground Space, ITA, Amsterdam, 2003, pp. 759–765.

triangular wedge, loaded by a soil silo (see Figure 1).

x h This wedge is assumed to be a rigid body, loaded its
y z = zh
effective weight and the overburden resulting from the
z soil silo.
From the equilibrium of the forces acting on the the
C wedge, the effective earth pressure acting towards the
tunnel face can be calculated. This force has to be
countered by the effective support force, which is the
difference between the total support pressure and the
F pore pressure in the soil. In most models, the effective
C
z = zt earth pressure can only be found for a given wedge
E angle θ , and as a result the required minimal support
B pressure is then found by iterating over all possible
D
values of the angle θ and maximising the effective
earth pressure.
Anagnostou & Kovári (1996) and Broere (2001)
B have shown that a wedge stability model can also be
z = zb
D
used to determine the face pressures in EPB shield tun-
ϑ nelling. Although the stability of the face is in general
A not considered a problem in EPB shield tunnelling, an
accurate indication of the minimal required support
Figure 1. Wedge and silo stability model. pressure is required to control the surface settlements
and to prevent a face collapse in the event of a partially
filled working chamber.
into the soil in order to rebuild the filter cake. The
time required to establish a perfectly sealing filter cake,
2.2 Influence of infiltration
however, is normally greater than the time between
subsequent passages of the cutter bits. As a result, dur- The effects of infiltration during excavation and the
ing excavation, there is a continuous inflow of filtrate resulting excess pore pressures can be included in a
water into the soil. This infiltration results in excess wedge stability analysis using a stationary groundwa-
pore pressures in front of the TBM and these excess ter flow model, as shown by Broere & van Tol (2000).
pore pressures lower the effective stresses of the soil. This model assumes that the continuous infiltration
They also lower the effectiveness of the slurry infiltra- process results in a partial filter cake during the excav-
tion and the combined effect is a reduced stability of ation process, and that part of the support pressure is
the tunnel face. transferred onto the soil skeleton by this partial filter
In an EPB shield the excavated soil is used to support cake. The remaining pressure 1pp is taken as input for
the tunnel face, often conditioned with additives like a simple one-dimensional groundwater flow model, so
bentonite slurry or foam. These additives are injected that the excess pore pressures at a distance x in front
into the working chamber at pressures above the pore of the face are given by
water pressure and will infiltrate the soil in front of the 
e−x

TBM, displacing the pore water present there. Part of 1p(x) = 1pp exp , (1)
the effectiveness of the foam treatment of the soil rests λ
in the fact that the foam replaces part of the pore water, where e is the infiltration length of the partial filter cake
lowering the water content of the soil (Maidl 1995). As and λ is the leakage length of the aquifer. The resulting
a result of this infiltration process excess pore pressure pore pressure distribution is sketched in Figure 2.
are generated in front of the face. Although the under- The excess pore pressures lower the effective
lying infiltration process differs slightly, the resulting stresses in the soil, thereby reducing the friction
excess pore pressures are much the same as observed between the collapsing soil body and the remaining
for a slurry machine. soil. This requires an increase in the support pres-
sure in order to stabilise the soil. Furthermore, the
2.1 Wedge stability model effectiveness of the support is reduced, as only part of
the support pressure is transferred onto the soil skel-
The aforementioned stability calculations by Jancsecz eton. The remainder of the support pressure drives the
& Steiner (1994), as well as Anagnostou & Kovári groundwater flow and generates the excess pore pres-
(1994), are based on the limit equilibrium analysis of sures. The combined result of these effects is that a
a wedge shaped soil body in front of the TBM, as higher support pressure is required than in case a per-
proposed by Horn (1961). The basic wedge stability fectly sealing filter cake is assumed. The effect is most
model is a limit equilibrium analysis, in which the significant in fine to medium sands, and negligible in
collapsing soil in front of the TBM is schematised as a clays where hardly any infiltration occurs.
2
 J. Saveur (ed.) (Re)Claiming the Underground Space, ITA, Amsterdam, 2003, pp. 759–765.

50
∆s
(kP a) 40
∆pfc
30

∆s 20

10
∆pp
p(x, z)
0
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11
x No.
∆p(w(z), z))
e Figure 3. Influence of soil types listed in Table 1 on the
s p0
minimal excess support pressure (difference between total
support pressure and pore pressure in rest).
ϑ

Figure 2. Schematic overview of the pressure drop over the 3 SECOND HEINENOORD
slurry infiltration zone and excess pore pressure distribution
in front of the face. The Second Heinenoord Tunnel is a twin-tube, 8.3m
outer diameter, 950m long bored tunnel under the
Table 1. Input parameters for various soil types to determine River Oude Maas in the vicinity of Rotterdam, con-
influence of permeability on calculated support pressure. structed between 1996 and 1999. As the first large
γ φ c k d10 a τF
bored tunnel in soft to very soft soils with high water
No. (kN/m3) (◦ ) (kPa) (m/s) (µm) (s) (Pa) pressures in the Netherlands, the tunnel was extens-
1 16 15 2 10−10 2 1 1 ively monitored. See Bakker et al. (2000) for a de-
2 17 17.5 10 10−9 5 1 1 scription of the soil conditions and the test programme.
3 17 17.5 5 10−8 5 5 1 At the north bank of the river a monitoring site was
4 18 22.5 5 10−7 10 10 5 instrumented with piezometers placed in the path of
5 18 27.5 2 10−6 10 60 5 the TBM. At this location the tunnel was excavated in
6 19 30 0 10−5 50 120 5 a highly stratified soil, with Holocene fine sands and
7 20 30 0 10−4 100 180 10 several soft clay layers along the top part of the tunnel
8 20 32.5 0 10−3 500 120 10 and with Pleistocene, medium to coarse, sands at the
9 20 35 0 10−2 1000 60 15 bottom part. The tunnel axis is situated approximately
10 20 35 0 10−1 2000 60 20 15 m below ground level and the average piezometric
11 20 40 0 100 4000 60 30 head lies 12.4 m above the tunnel. A small tidal vari-
ation can be observed in this head, slightly delayed
with respect to the tidal fluctuation observed in the
This is illustrated by a parameter analysis in Broere river.
(2001), where calculations have been made for several The piezometer placed in the soil was constantly
soil types with increasing permeability. The proper- monitored during the approach of the TBM, up to the
ties of these soils are listed in Table 1, where k is the time the piezometer was excavated by the TBM and
permeability and d10 the characteristic grain size. The destroyed. The pore pressures are plotted in Figure 4
infiltration half-time a and yield strength τF character- as a function of the distance between the TBM and the
ise the behaviour of the slurry in combination with the piezometer, and are compared with the excess pore
soil type. The parameters are indicative for soils ran- pressures according to (1). The excess pore pressure
ging from clayey (1) to sandy (7) to gravelly (11). The increase as soon as excavation starts and rises over time
resulting minimal excess support pressures (the differ- as the TBM approaches the piezometer. The vertical
ence between total support pressure and pore pressure downward spikes at 1.5 m intervals are caused by the
in rest) for a 10 m diameter TBM with a cover of 15 dissipation of excess pore pressures during stand-still.
m are shown in Figure 3. The peak excess pore pressures correspond well with
It can be seen that the highest excess support pres- the calculated profile.
sures are needed in sandy soils with permeabilities
10−5 < k < 10−3 m/s. This corresponds with the
field observations by Mori (1995) that the reduction 4 TRANSIENT GROUNDWATER FLOW
in effective support pressure due to excess pore pres-
sures can become a major problem in soils with per- For the soil conditions at the Second Heinenoord, the
meabilities within the indicated range, as well as with groundwater flow in front of the TBM reached station-
field observations made during the construction of the ary conditions after approximately 5 min. And within
Second Heinenoordtunnel in the Netherlands. 30 min. after the TBM was stopped, no excess pore
3
 J. Saveur (ed.) (Re)Claiming the Underground Space, ITA, Amsterdam, 2003, pp. 759–765.

200 √
with u = Ss /k and erfc(x) the complementary error-
190
function. In order to use this equation to predict the
180
gauge
excess pore pressures in front of the tunnel face, an
pore pressure p in kPa

x
170 TBM estimate of the discharge Q is needed. For a slurry
160
shield Mohkam (1985) reports that the amount of water
displaced by the infiltrating slurry is roughly equal to
150
the porosity of the excavated material. This leads to
140 an estimated discharge per unit area of the tunnel
130

120 q = −nv (4)

110
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35
with n the porosity and v the advance rate of the TBM.
distance to gauge x in m
In a foam-conditioned EPB machine the amount of wa-
ter displaced depends on the foam injection rate, but
Figure 4. Measured excess pore pressures in front of TBM
as the amount of foam injected is often of the same
at the Second Heinenoord, compared with pore pressure
order as the porosity of the excavated material, and
according to (1) (dashed) displaces the pore water originally present, the above
relation can also be used to get an estimate of the dis-
pressures remained. For these conditions the use of a charge in this case.
stationary groundwater flow model to predict the in- The calculated piezometric head 8 can be used in-
fluence of infiltration is sufficient. However, for many stead of (1) in the wedge stability analysis. In that
cases where the infiltration has a significant effect on way the minimal required support pressure, at time t
the stability of the face, the permeability and storage after boring has started, can be calculated, as well as
capacity of the aquifers are such that stationary flow the pore pressures generated in front of the face. If the
is not reached within the 30 to 60 minutes it normally discharge Q has been estimated correctly, the excess
takes to excavate a lining ring. pore pressures predicted by (3) will approach those
In these cases the infiltration process can be mod- given by (1) over time.
elled using a transient groundwater flow model When the excess pore pressure distribution at the
coupled to the wedge stability calculation. A sim- time the TBM stops are known, these can be used as
ilar transient groundwater flow model can be used to input to calculate the dissipation over time. This will,
evaluate the dissipation rate of the generated excess however, lead to a rather complex solution or require
pore pressures, as the excess pore pressures will not the use of numerical solution methods. Assuming that
always be fully dissipated when the next excavation stationary flow conditions according to (1) have been
cycle starts. Combining these effects in a stability reached as the excavation ends, simplifies the prob-
analysis allows the effects of the infiltration process on lem somewhat. In that case the excess pore pressures
the stability of the tunnel face to be quantified, without remaining at time t after boring has stopped can be
overestimating their influence. estimated from (see Bruggeman 1999)
A problem with this approach forms the fact that the
solution of the basic differential equations for transient   √ 
1pp xu t x 
flow can become rather complex. For the case of a ϕ − ϕ0 = erfc √ + exp (5)
semi-confined aquifer, the basic equations are given 2γw 2 t uλ λ
√ 
by Strack (1989) as
  x 
xu t
+erfc − √ + exp − ,
8 Ss 2 t uλ λ
∇ 28 = + ∂t 8 (2)
λ2 k
which is remarkably similar to (3).
where 8 the potential in the aquifer defined as 8 = From the equations (3) and (5) it can be found that,
kH (ϕ − ϕ0 ), ϕ the piezometric head, Ss the coefficient in those cases where the excess pore pressures do not
of specific storage and k the permeability. reach equilibrium shortly after boring has started and
If the problem is simplified to a single, one- a transient flow model is needed to accurately describe
dimensional aquifer of height H , with a discharge Q the build-up of excess pore pressures, the time required
at x = 0 and has a constant head ϕ0 at infinity, the for the excess pore pressures to fully dissipate will also
solution to (2) has been given by Bruggeman (1999) be large. If in an undisturbed boring process the stand-
as still period, between the boring of two subsequent tun-
  √  nel rings, is of the same order as the time needed to
Qλ xu t x 
ϕ − ϕ0 = erfc √ + exp (3) excavate a tunnel ring, part of the pore pressures gen-
4kH 2 t uλ λ erated during the first excavation period will remain
 √   x 
xu t when the boring of the next ring is started. This will
−erfc √ − exp − be illustrated using an example.
2 t uλ λ
4

∆p(kP a)
140
120
100
80
60
40
20
0
0 2 4 6 8 10
t (h)
Figure 5. Excess pore pressures at the face due to infiltration
and dissipation over time.
4.1 Prediction of Pore Pressures at the Face
Alternating (3) and (5) during boring and stand-still,
the time-dependant excess pore pressures in an aquifer
resulting from the infiltration of slurry or foam can be
predicted. For a fine, silty sand layer with λ = 9m,
Ss = 7 · 10−4 m−1 , k = 10−5 m/s and n = 0.4
this is illustrated in figure 5. The average advance
rate of the TBM has been chosen v = 5cm/min and
H/D = 1.33, with D the diameter of the TBM. It is
further assumed that the excavation of a single tun-
nel ring takes 45 minutes and the stand-still between
subsequent excavation periods is 75 minutes. For two
consecutive rings the excess pore pressure at the face
has been plotted as a function of time. It can be clearly
seen that the time needed for the generated excess
pore pressures to fully dissipate is longer than the time
between subsequent excavation periods. At the start
of the second excavation approximately 20% of the
generated excess pore pressures remains.
5 BOTLEK RAIL TUNNEL
The Botlek rail tunnel is a 9.65m diameter twin-tunnel
bored through Holocene and Pleistocene sand, clay
and peat layers in the vicinity of Rotterdam, the Neth-
erlands. The soil conditions are roughly similar to
those at the Second Heinenoord, soft Holocene clays
and sands over a Pleistocene sand layer. The Holo-
cene sand layer in which the first part of the tunnel
was constructed can be simplified as in the example
in §4.1. The tunnel has been constructed using a
foam-conditioned earth-pressure balance shield and at
several points along the tunnel alignment piezometers
have been placed in the projected path of the TBM, as
part of an extensive research program (COB 2001).
The excess pore pressures measured at location
MQ1 have been plotted against time in figure 6. The
J. Saveur (ed.) (Re)Claiming the Underground Space, ITA, Amsterdam, 2003, pp. 759–765.
∆p(kP a)
140
120
100
80
60
40
20
0
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
t (day)
12
Figure 6. Pore pressure measurements at Botlek Rail, MQ1
as function of time (BTC/NS-RIB 2000).
peak excess pore pressures are measured during the ac-
tual excavation periods and the subsequent drops with
the periods of ring building and maintenance. The
measurements made at day 4 show clearly that the
excess pore pressures are not fully dissipated as the
excavation of the next tunnel ring starts. Only during
the stop on day 5 the TBM is halted long enough for
the excess pore pressures to fully dissipate.
The measurements are also plotted in figure 7 as a
function of the distance between the piezometer and
the TBM. In this way they can be compared with the
predicted excess pore pressures from (3) at 45 minutes
after boring has started, and from (5) 90 minutes after
boring has stopped. It should be noted that the ex-
cess pore pressure distribution in the first few metres
from the face has the greatest influence on the face
stability. Even with the rather simplified groundwater
flow model, the comparison between prediction and
measurements is reasonable.
6 CONCLUSIONS
During excavation with a slurry shield or a foam-
conditioned EPB shield in a medium or fine sand layer,
the infiltration of bentonite slurry or foam into the
soil will generate excess pore pressures in front of the
face. These excess pore pressures lower the effective
stresses in the soil as well as the effectiveness of the
support medium. These effects lower the stability of
the face and a significantly higher effective support
pressure may be required to prevent a face collapse.
The effect can be included in a wedge stability ana-
lysis using a simplified analytical groundwater flow
model. The influence on the minimal required support
pressure is greatest in fine sands with a permeability
in the order of 10−5 < k < 10−3 m/s. Furthermore,
depending on the geohydrological conditions, a transi-
ent flow model may be needed to accurately predict the
pore pressures in front of the TBM during excavation,
5
 J. Saveur (ed.) (Re)Claiming the Underground Space, ITA, Amsterdam, 2003, pp. 759–765.

∆p (kPa) groundwater flow on tunnel face stability. In Kusakabe,

140
O., K. Fujita & Y. Miyazaki (eds), Geotechnical Aspects
of Underground Construction in Soft Ground, pp. 339–
120
344. Balkema.
100 Bruggeman, G.A. 1999. Analytical Solutions in Geohydro-
logical Problems. Elsevier.
80 (3) BTC/NS-RIB 2000. Waterspanningsmeting MQ1. Personal
Communication.
60 COB 2001. Praktijkonderzoek botlekspoortunnel. Tech-
nical Report F300, COB.
40
Horn, N. 1961. Horizontaler Erddruck auf senkrechte Ab-
20
schlussflächen von Tunnelröhren. In Landeskonferenz
(5) der Ungarischen Tiefbauindustrie, pp. 7–16.
0 Jancsecz, S. & W. Steiner 1994. Face support for a large
0 10 20 30 40 50 mix-shield in heterogenous ground conditions. In Tun-
x (m)
neling ’94. London, Institution of Mining and Metal-
Figure 7. Excess pore pressure profiles according to (3) at lurgy.
t = 0.75h and (5) at t = 1.5h, compared with measure- Kanayasu, S., I. Kubota & N. Shikibu 1995. Stability of face
ments at Botlek Rail, MQ1. during shield tunneling – A survey of Japanese shield
tunneling. In Fujita, K. & Kusakabe (eds), Underground
Construction in Soft Ground, pp. 337–343. Rotterdam,
as the time required to reach equilibrium flow can be Balkema.
larger than the time needed to excavate a single tunnel Krause, T. 1987. Schildvortrieb mit flüssigkeits- und er-
ring. Using a stationary flow model overpredicts the dgestützter Ortsbrust. PhD thesis, Technischen Uni-
influence in these cases. versität Carolo-Wilhelmina, Braunschweig.
Transient flow calculations show that close to the
Leca, E. & L. Dormieux 1990. Upper and lower bound
face the excess pore pressures will increase quickly
solutions for the face stability of shallow circular tunnels
after excavating has started and also that it generally
in frictional material. Géotechnique, 40(4):581–606.
takes longer for the excess pore pressures to com-
pletely dissipate than the average ring-building time. Maidl, U. 1995. Erweiterung der Einsatzbereiche der Er-
For a presented case approximately 20% of the excess ddruckschilde durch Bodenkonditionerung mit Schaum.
pore pressure generated remained after 75 minutes PhD thesis, Ruhr Universität Bochum.
of stand-still. The calculated excess pore pressures Mohkam, M. & C. Bouyat 1985. Research studies for slurry
are comparable to those observed in front of a foam- shield tunneling. In 4th International Conference of the
conditioned earth pressure balance shield in a fine Institution of Mining and Metallurgy, pp. 235–241.
sandy soil during construction of the Botlek Rail tun- Mori, A., K. Kurihara & H. Mori 1995. A study on face
nel. stability during slurry type shield tunneling. In Fujita,
K. & Kusakabe (eds), Underground Construction in Soft
Ground, pp. 261–264. Rotterdam, Balkema.
REFERENCES Strack, O.D.L. 1989. Groundwater Mechanics. Prentice
Hall.
Anagnostou, G. & K. Kovári 1994. The face stability
of slurry-shield-driven tunnels. Tunneling and Under-
ground Space Technology, 9(2):165–174.
Anagnostou, G. & K. Kovári 1996. Face stability in slurry
and EPB shield tunneling. In Mair, R.J. & R.N. Taylor
(eds), Geotechnical Aspects of Underground Construc-
tion in Soft Ground, pp. 453–458. Rotterdam, Balkema.
Bakker, K.J., F. de Boer & J.B.M. Admiraal 2000. Mon-
itoring the Second Heinenoord tunnel and the Botlek
Rail tunnel, two independent research programs on bored
tunneling in soft soil. In Kusakabe, O., K. Fujita &
Y. Miyazaki (eds), Geotechnical Aspects of Underground
Construction in Soft Ground, pp. 191–196. Balkema.
Broere, W. 2001. Tunnel Face Stability & New CPT Ap-
plications. PhD thesis, Delft University of Technology,
Delft.
Broere, W. & A.F. van Tol 2000. Influence of infiltration and
6