Soil Erosion as an Instability Problem

Geomaterials are multiphasic systems that are comprised of solids, fluids and gases, including interactions between them. Phenomena such as soil erosion may occur in major hydraulic structures, and their analyses go beyond traditional approaches which are mostly empirical in nature. Internal erosion occurs when particles are dislodged from the solid skeleton due to seepage forces and thereafter transported into the available pore space. Hence, any analysis has to be carried out at the pore and solid scales where notions of instabilities introduced in earlier chapters can be readily applied. Two fundamental types of internal erosion can be distinguished: piping and suffusion. This chapter is concerned only with the latter which corresponds to the transport of fine particles through the pores of the coarse matrix.