• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Soil and Groundwater Environment Conference
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• 1998.11a
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• pp.216-220
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• 1998

Experimental studies were carried out to investigate water diffusion in unsaturated compacted bentonite for a landfill of hazardous wastes. Water content distributions were measured and water diffusion coefficients were determined when the dry densities of compacted bentonite were in the range of 1.4 - 1.8 g/㎤. Resaturation times were also calculated to analyze the ability of the compacted bentonite to retard water movement. The results obtained were as follows: Diffusion model described properly the water migration in unsaturated compacted bentonite. Water diffusion coefficients ranged from 4.30$\times$10$^{-6}$ $\textrm{cm}^2$/sec to 1.93$\times$10$^{-6}$ $\textrm{cm}^2$/sec, and decreased with increasing the dry density. The dry density of compacted bentonite was found to be an important factor to control the resaturation time by water. This study suggests that the domestic compacted bentonite should be a good barrier material against water movement in a landfill of hazardous wastes.

• Journal of Environmental Science International
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• v.27 no.5
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• pp.341-344
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• 2018

This study was conducted to determine the effects of dietary bentonite supplementation on the fatty acid profiles of eggs in older laying hens. A total of 90 Hy-line Brown layers, 74 weeks of age, were confined in 6 wire cages and then assigned randomly to two groups to receive one of the two diets (3 replicates of 15 older layers each) containing 0 and 0.2% bentonite for 4 weeks. After the 4-week feeding trial, no remarkable differences in individual fatty acid, saturated fatty acid (SFA), unsaturated fatty acid (UFA), and mono unsaturated fatty acid (MUFA) levels were found. However, linoleic acid, docosahexaenoic acid, and poly unsaturated fatty acid (PUFA) and UFA/SFA ratio were influenced by 0.2% bentonite. In conclusion, supplementation with 0.2% bentonite improved the profiles of PUFA more than those of SFA, UFA, and MUFA inthe eggs of the older laying hens.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.33 no.1
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• pp.62-72
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• 2001

The one-dimensional finite element program was developed to analyze the coupled behavior of heat, moisture, and air transfer in unsaturated porous media. By using this program, the simulation results were compared with those from the laboratory infiltration tests under isothermal condition and temperature gradient condition, respectively. The discrepancy of water uptake was found in the upper region of a bentonite sample under isothermal condition between numerical simulation and laboratory experiment. This indicated that air pressure was built up in the bentonite sample which could retard the infiltration velocity of liquid. In order to consider the swelling phenomena of compacted bentonite which cause the discrepancy of the distribution of water content and temperature, swelling and shrinkage factors were incorporated into the finite element formulation. It was found that these factors could be effective to represent the moisture diffusivity and unsaturated hydraulic conductivity due to volume change of bentonite sample.

• Journal of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology(JNFCWT)
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• v.12 no.1
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• pp.69-77
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• 2014

Unsaturated hydraulic conductivity of the bentonite-buffer was evaluated using the relative humidity data. The method for calculating unsaturated hydraulic conductivity was deduced from the general analytical equation representing the movement of water in unsaturated media, which was applied to the experimental results of water infiltration tests for identifying the behavior of unsaturated hydraulic conductivity according to the water saturation. Unlike the saturated condition, the hydraulic gradient and water flux were irregularly changed, and the unsaturated hydraulic conductivity was increased with increasing the experimental time. Swelling of bentonite grains due to the water absorption increased the volume and size of pore within bentonite, resulting in the increase of water velocity and unsaturated hydraulic conductivity. This result suggested the necessity of further investigation on the correlation between the swelling degree of bentonite-buffer and unsaturated hydraulic conductivity. The method used in this study can be useful technique for evaluating long-term hydraulic performance of bentonite-buffer in the radioactive waste disposal system.

• Journal of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology(JNFCWT)
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.329-338
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• 2019

Suction of unsaturated bentonite buffers is a very important input parameter for hydro-mechanical performance assessment and design of an engineered barrier system. This study analyzed suction measurement techniques and constitutive models of unsaturated porous media reported in the literature, and suggested suction measurement techniques and constitutive models suitable for bentonite buffer in an HLW repository. The literature review showed the suction of bentonite buffer to be much higher than that of soil, as measured by total suction including matric suction and osmotic suction. The measurement methods (RH-Cell, RH-Cell/Sensor) using a relative humidity sensor were suitable for suction measurement of the bentonite buffer; the RH-Cell /Sensor method was more preferred in consideration of the temperature change due to radioactive decay heat and measurement time. Various water retention models of bentonite buffers have been proposed through experiments, but the van Genuchten model is mainly used as a constitutive model of hydro-mechanical performance assessment of unsaturated buffers. The water characteristic curve of bentonite buffers showed different tendencies according to bentonite type, dry density, temperature, salinity, sample state and hysteresis. Selection of water retention models and determination of model input parameters should consider the effects of these controlling factors so as to improve overall reliability.

• The Journal of Engineering Geology
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• v.15 no.2 s.42
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• pp.123-132
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• 2005

This study presents the results of a laboratory investigation performed to study physical properties of soil-bentonite mixtures through the vertical permeation test and dielectric measurement test using Frequency Domain Reflectometry system for the liner of waste landfill. For the laboratory experiments, geotechnical testing was conducted on pre-mixed soil-bentonite which is consisted of standard sand, weathered granite soil and bentonite for estimating physical parameters such as a volumetric water content, void ratio and dielectric constant. In experiment results, initial soil-bentonite mixing rate has an effect of change of volumetric water content. Also change of volumetric water content of a soil-bentonite mixture is clearly detected to measure a response of dielectric constant. In order to estimate an unsaturated permeable property of soil-bentonite mixtures, equations between volumetric water content and dielectric constant were derived from this study.

• Proceedings of the Korean Radioactive Waste Society Conference
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• 2018.05a
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• pp.155-156
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• 2018

• Proceedings of the Korean Radioactive Waste Society Conference
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• 2017.10a
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• pp.145-146
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• 2017

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.38-51
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• 2019

Barcelona Basic Model (BBM) can describe not only swelling owing to decrease in effective stress, but also wetting-induced swelling due to decrease in suction. And the BBM can also consider increase in cohesion and apparent preconsolidation stress with suction, and decrease in the apparent preconsolidation stress with temperature. Therefore, the BBM is widely used all over the world to predict and to analyze coupled thermo-hydro-mechanical behavior of bentonite which is considered as buffer materials at the engineered barrier system in the high-level radioactive waste disposal system. However, the BBM is not well known in Korea, so this paper introduce the BBM to Korean rock engineers and geotechnical engineers. In this study, Modified Cam Clay (MCC) model is introduced before all, because the BBM was first developed as an extension of the MCC model to unsaturated soil conditions. Then, the thermo-elasto-plastic version of the BBM is described in detail.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.36 no.10
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• pp.33-39
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• 2020

A geological repository has been considered as an option for the disposal of high-level radioactive waste (HLW). The HLW is disposed in a host rock at a depth of 500~1,000 meters below the ground surface based on the concept of engineered barrier system (EBS). The EBS is composed of a disposal canister, buffer material, backfill material, and gap-filling material. The compacted bentonite buffer is very important since it can restrain the release of radionuclide and protect the canister from the inflow of ground water. The saturation of the buffer decreases because high temperature in a disposal canister is released into the surrounding buffer material, but saturation of the buffer increases because of the inflow of ground water. The unsaturated properties of the buffer are critical input parameters for the entire safety assessment of the engineered barrier system. In Korea, Gyeongju bentonite can be considered as a candidate buffer material, but there are few test results of the unsaturated properties considering temperature variation. Therefore, this paper conducted experiment of soil-water characteristic curve for the Gyeongju compacted bentonite considering temperature variation under a constant water content condition. The relative error showed approximately 2% between test results and modified van-Genuchten model values.