Planning Tunnel Construction Using Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC)

Juan P. Vargas, Jair C. Koppe, Sebastián Pérez and Juan P. Hurtado

Mathematical Problems in Engineering, 2015, vol. 2015, 1-8

Abstract:

Tunnels, drifts, drives, and other types of underground excavation are very common in mining as well as in the construction of roads, railways, dams, and other civil engineering projects. Planning is essential to the success of tunnel excavation, and construction time is one of the most important factors to be taken into account. This paper proposes a simulation algorithm based on a stochastic numerical method, the Markov chain Monte Carlo method, that can provide the best estimate of the opening excavation times for the classic method of drilling and blasting. Taking account of technical considerations that affect the tunnel excavation cycle, the simulation is developed through a computational algorithm. Using the Markov chain Monte Carlo method, the unit operations involved in the underground excavation cycle are identified and assigned probability distributions that, with random number input, make it possible to simulate the total excavation time. The results obtained with this method are compared with a real case of tunneling excavation. By incorporating variability in the planning, it is possible to determine with greater certainty the ranges over which the execution times of the unit operations fluctuate. In addition, the financial risks associated with planning errors can be reduced and the exploitation of resources maximized.

Date: 2015
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://downloads.hindawi.com/journals/MPE/2015/797953.pdf (application/pdf)
http://downloads.hindawi.com/journals/MPE/2015/797953.xml (text/xml)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hin:jnlmpe:797953

DOI: 10.1155/2015/797953

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Mathematical Problems in Engineering from Hindawi
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Mohamed Abdelhakeem ().