Numerical Simulation of Seepage and Stability of Tailing Dams: A Case Study in Ledong, China

Abstract

Tailings dams are built to safely store tailings and to protect the natural environment from damage. However, tailings dam accidents occur frequently, endangering the safety of life and property, and causing pollution to the environment. Many tailings dam accidents are caused by seepage. As such, this study takes the No. II tailings dam of Ledong Baolun Gold Mine in Hainan Province as an example and builds a two-dimensional finite element model to simulate the seepage field. The effects of normal-water-level and high-water-level conditions on the total head, pressure head, and wetting line of the main and auxiliary dams were compared. The results show that higher water levels in both the main dam and the auxiliary dam lead to a higher pressure head at the top of the dam, lower pressure head at the bottom of the dam, higher total pressure head, and at the same time, a higher wetting line, and greater destabilization. In this study, the seepage deformation failure of the main dam and the auxiliary dam, in both cases, does not occur.