• Explosives and Blasting
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• v.41 no.3
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• pp.62-72
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• 2023

The aging of plant structures due to industrialization in the 1970s has increased the demand for blast demolition. While blasting can reduce exposure to environmental pollution by shortening the demolition period, improper blasting design and construction plans pose significant safety risks. Thus, it is vital to consider optimal blasting demolition conditions and other factors through collapse behavior simulation. This study utilizes a 3-D combined finite-discrete element method (FDEM) code-based 3-D DFPA to simulate the collapse of a chimney structure in a thermal power plant in Seocheon, South Korea. The collapse behavior from the numerical simulation is compared to the actual structure collapse, and the numerical simulation result presents good agreement with the actual building demolition. Additionally, various numerical simulations have been conducted on the chimney models to analyze the impact of the duct size in the pre-weakening area. The no-duct, duct, and double-area duct models were compared in terms of crack pattern and history of Z-axis displacement. The findings show that the elapse-time for demolition decreases as the area of the duct increases, causing collapse to occur quickly by increasing the load-bearing area.