Simulation of Seismic Waves from Underground Explosions in Geologic Media: FY2009 Progress Report
This report summarizes work done after one year on project LL09-Sim-NDD-02 entitled 'Exploratory Research: Advanced Simulation of Low Yield Underground Nuclear Explosions To Improve Seismic Yield Estimation and Source Identification'. Work on this effort proceeded in two thrusts: (1) parametric studies of underground explosion generated motions with GEODYN; and (2) coupling of GEODYN to WPP. GEODYN is a code for modeling hydrodynamic (shock-wave) motions in a wide variety of materials, including earth materials. WPP is an anelastic finite difference code for modeling seismic motions. The sensitivity of seismic motions to emplacement conditions was investigated with a series of parametric studies of low-yield (0.2-4 kiloton) chemical high-explosive shots at a range of burial depths in four canonical geologic media (granite, limestone, tuff and alluvium). Results indicate that the material has a strong impact on the seismic motions consistent with previous reports. Motions computed with GEODYN in realistically complex material models are very consistent with reported motions from nuclear tests by Perret and Bass (1975). The amplitude, frequency content and cavity size resulting from explosions are all strongly sensitive to the material strength. Explosions in high-strength (granite) resulted in the highest amplitude, shortest duration pulse and smallest cavities, whereas explosions in low-strength material (alluvium) resulted in the lowest amplitudes, longest duration pulse and larger cavities. The corner frequencies of P-wave motions at take-off angles corresponding to propagation to teleseismic distances show corresponding behavior, with high-strength materials having the highest corner frequency and low-strength materials having low corner frequency. Gravity has an important effect on the cavity size and outgoing motions due work done against lithostatic stress. In fact without gravity the cavity radius and elastic motions are largely insensitive to depth of burial. We investigated the effects of depth of burial for a given yield and material model in the presence of gravity and found that the cavity radius is slightly smaller for deeper shots and the resulting motions have shorter duration and higher corner frequency compared to shallower shots. On the second thrust, progress has been made on one-way coupling of GEODYN to WPP. Early in the project we demonstrated this capability from one-dimensional (1D) GEODYN calculations. We have now completed the capability to pass motions computed in 2D or 3D with GEODYN to WPP and propagated (in 3D) to large distances.
- Research Organization:
- Lawrence Livermore National Lab. (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE
- DOE Contract Number:
- W-7405-ENG-48
- OSTI ID:
- 970168
- Report Number(s):
- LLNL-TR-420208; TRN: US201003%%206
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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