Influence of spatial variability of permeability property on steady state seepage flow and slope stability analysis

In recent years, spatial variability modeling of soil parameters using random field theory has gained distinct importance in geotechnical analysis. In the present study, commercially available finite difference numerical code FLAC 5.0 is used for modeling the permeability parameter as spatially correlated log-normally distributed random variable and its influence on the steady state seepage flow and on the slope stability analysis are studied. Considering the case of a 5.0 m high cohesive–frictional soil slope of 30°, a range of coefficients of variation (CoV%) from 60 to 90% in the permeability values, and taking different values of correlation distance in the range of 0.5–15 m, parametric studies, using Monte Carlo simulations, are performed to study the following three aspects, i.e., (i) effect of stochastic soil permeability on the statistics of seepage flow in comparison to the analytic (Dupuit′s) solution available for the uniformly constant permeability property; (ii) strain and deformation pattern, and (iii) stability of the given slope assessed in terms of factor of safety (FS). The results obtained in this study are useful to understand the role of permeability variations in slope stability analysis under different slope conditions and material properties.