Coupling between progressive damage and permeability of concrete: analysis with a discrete model

A significant increase of the permeability of concrete upon micro-cracking and a good correlation between the evolution of damage (material stiffness) and permeability are observed experimentally. The present contribution investigates this correlation theoretically, with the help of lattice analyses. Scaling analysis of lattices which contain elastic brittle bonds has shown that the material degradation should be described by the evolution of the material stiffness, or compliance, in a continuum setting (damage models). This result is reviewed and further documented in the first part of the paper. In the second part, hydro-mechanical problems are considered with the construction of a hydraulic lattice, dual to the mechanical one. We observe that the average permeability upon micro-cracking is the lattice scale-independent controlling variable in the hydraulic problem. Additionally, results show that in a continuum poro-mechanical approach, the evolution of the material permeability ought to be related to the elastic unloading stiffness, described e.g. with the help of continuum damage variables. Copyright (c) 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.