DOMAIN DECOMPOSITION USING BEM FOR SEEPAGE ANALYSIS BENEATH A DAM UNDERLAIN BY NON-HOMOGENEOUS DEPOSIT

摘要

A seepage problem beneath an impermeable dam is analyzed, and the flow head and flownets distribution determined using boundary element method (BEM) which requires boundary-only discretization. Since BEM is only applicable to homogeneous problems, the idea of domain decomposition is used to solve the non-homogeneous orthotropic cases. Verification has been achieved using finite element method (FEM) that requires both domain and boundary discretization. The obvious advantage of BEM over FEM is the fact that results of high accuracy with lesser computational time and effort can be obtained. Results achieved indicate an excellent agreement between the BEM-based and FEM approaches.