An energy criterion in process of rockburst

Rockburst is one kind of dynamic geological disasters, which seriously threatens the safety of design and construction in deep underground engineering. However, the traditional methods for predicting rockburst can only give a qualitative assessment of rockburst proneness based on the results of static quantitative calculation. It can not reasonably reflect the occurrence process of rockburst. In order to have more accurate projections for rockburst, based on the test and theoretical analysis, an intensive study on the mechanism of rockburst is carried out thereby. In essence, the study indicates that the mechanism of rockburst should be studied based on the dynamic propagation of the crack in rock mass. Then, a definition of rockburst is given from the perspective of the dynamic propagation of the crack. Finally, based on the above, a new energy criterion of rockburst-unit time relative local energy release index(URLERI) is put forward. And it is used for numerical simulation of the rockburst case for Jinping II hydropower station. The results show that there's a general agreement between simulating results and practical. And it shows that the energy criterion of rockburst is quite reasonable. The research results offered by this paper, no matter in evaluating, forecasting and preventing of the rockburst disaster in deep underground engineering, have its own significance in theory and in application. ©, 2015, Academia Sinica. All right reserved.