Simulation of Heat Transfer in Freezing Soils Using

ABAQUS
Ming Zhu and Radoslaw L. Michalowski
Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Abstract: Freezing saturated soils are mixtures of solid particles, water, and ice. Heat transfer in
freezing soils is a complex process because of the multi-phase nature of the mixture. The phase
change of the liquid part adds complexity, since not all water changes phase at the freezing
temperature. Difficulties with convergence are known to appear when simulating the process. A
numerical procedure for the soil freezing process is developed and implemented using the
subroutine UMATHT in ABAQUS system. Examples of one-dimensional and two-dimensional
freezing problems in saturated soils are presented in this paper.
Keywords: Heat Transfer, Soils, Pipeline, Finite Element Method

1. Introduction
Heat transfer in freezing soils is a complex process because of the multi-phase nature of the soil
mixtures. Three important effects associated with the freezing process are: (1) effect of the latent
heat during the phase change of water, (2) nonlinearity of the soil thermal properties, and (3) the
existence of unfrozen water in frozen soil. As the soil is subjected to freezing, liquid water inside
soil pores turns into ice. However, not all water freezes at the freezing temperature. The amount of
unfrozen water drops as the temperature decreases, but some liquid water is still present in frozen
soil at temperature well below 0C. As a result, the latent heat of fusion of water is released over a
range of temperature rather than at one particular temperature. Release of the latent heat has a
strong influence on the temperature profile and retards the frost penetration. As freezing front
penetrates into soil, thermal properties of the frozen soil also change. The thermal conductivity
and the heat capacity of soil vary with the volumetric fractions of phases, which are dependent on
the temperature.
The objective of this paper is to present a numerical procedure for simulating the transient heat
transfer in freezing soils. User subroutine UMATHT in ABAQUS system has been developed to
implement the heat transfer model for freezing soils. Simulations of one-dimensional and twodimensional freezing problems in saturated soils are presented to show the capability of the
procedure. Results of the temperature profile, frost penetration, and, ice and water distribution in
the soil are shown in this paper.

2005 ABAQUS Users Conference

2. Transient heat transfer in soils

Some assumptions are made for the transient heat transfer analysis in soils:

The heat transfer takes place by conduction only.

The soil is fully saturated.

The thermal conductivity of soil is isotropic.

The volume change of water upon freezing is negligible.

No frost heaving and water migration is associated with the freezing process.

The heat conduction is described as

T
L i i (T ) = 0
t
t

(1)

where, T is the temperature, t is the time, c is the volumetric heat capacity of the soil mixture,

i is the density of ice, i is the volumetric fraction of ice, L is the latent heat of fusion per unit

+
+
is the gradient operator, and,
x y z
is the effective thermal conductivity of the soil mixture. The first term in Equation 1 represents
the change in energy storage with respect to time. The second term represents the rate of the latent
heat released during the change of water into ice. The third term represents the net energy flow by
conduction. After incorporating the latent heat into the heat capacity, Equation 1 can be rewritten
as

mass of water (approximately 3.33 10 5 J / kg ), =

( c Li
where c Li

i T
)
= ( T )
T t

(2)

i
is termed the apparent volumetric heat capacity.
T

The volumetric heat capacity of a saturated soil mixture is defined as the sum of the volumetric
heat capacities of the three phases multiplied by their volumetric fractions

c = wcw w + i ci i + s cs s

(3)

Where, c is the mass heat capacity, with subscripts w , i and s standing for water, ice and soil
skeleton, respectively. The product of the density and the mass heat capacity is the volumetric heat
capacity. The effective thermal conductivity of the soil mixture also is a function of the volumetric
composition of the three phases, and it can be expressed as follows

= s s ww i i
2

(4)
2004 ABAQUS Users Conference

The typical values of thermal properties for soil skeleton, water and ice are listed in Table 1. These
values were used in the simulations.
Table 1. Thermal properties of soil constituents (Williams and Smith, 1989).

Soil skeleton
(clay mineral)
Water
ice

Density
(kg/m3)

Mass heat
capacity
c (J/kg C)

Volumetric heat
Capacity
c (J/ m3 C)

2620

900

2.3610

1000
917

4180
2100

Thermal
conductivity
(W/m C)

2.92

0.56
2.24

4.1810
6
1.9310

The unfrozen water content plays an important role in heat transfer in soils. It determines not only
how much latent heat is released, but also the thermal properties. A 3-parameter function which is
flexible enough to describe the unfrozen water content for most soils (Michalowski 1993) is used
in this paper
w = w* + ( w w* )e a (T T0 )

(5)

where, w is the unfrozen water content at the freezing temperature T0 , w* is the residual
unfrozen water content at some low temperature, and parameter a controls the curvature. Figure 1
shows the comparison of the unfrozen water content curve from Equation 5 to a real test result
(Fukuda 1997). The parameters are: w = 0.058, w* = 0.285, T0 = 0C, and a = 0.16.

Unfrozen water conten

(fraction of dry weight)

0.5
Test result

0.4

Equation 5

0.3
0.2
0.1
0
-25

-20

-15

-10

-5

Temperature (C)

Figure 1. Unfrozen water content.

Provided with the unfrozen water content, the volumetric ice content can be calculated using the
following equation

2005 ABAQUS Users Conference

i = n

s
(1 n) w
w

(6)

Where, n is the soil porosity and w is a function of temperature as in Equation 5. ABAQUS

contains the user subroutine UMATHT which can be used to implement the heat conduction
model and the thermal behavior of the freezing soil.

3. Numerical examples
One-dimensional and two dimensional soil freezing problems are presented in this paper to show
the capability of the numerical procedure. The same soil is used for both simulations. The soil is
fully saturated with a porosity of 0.427, which corresponds to an initial unfrozen water content of
0.285 prior to freezing. The unfrozen water content using Equation 5 is shown in Figure 1. The
thermal properties are listed in Table 1.
3.1

One-dimensional soil freezing problem

The soil specimen in the 1-D problem is 7cm tall. Freezing occurs from the bottom up. The initial
temperature is 5C throughout the soil mass. The temperature at the bottom drops down to -5C
suddenly, while the temperature at the top is kept constant at 5C. The temperature gradient is not
zero only in the vertical direction. 2-D mesh with only one element in the horizontal direction is
used to simulate the 1-D heat flow. The soil is divided into 30 elements in the vertical direction.
The 4-node linear diffusive heat transfer element DC2D4 is chosen to perform the analysis. The
total simulation time is 40 hours.
The frost penetration is shown in Figure 2(a) as a function of time. The profiles of the temperature,
the ice content and the unfrozen water content are shown in Figure 2(b), Figure 2(c) and Figure
2(d), respectively. The results are given for the following instances (in hours): 0.009, 0.037, 0.15,
0.3, 0.6, 1.2, 2.2, 3.2, 4.2, 5.2, 6.2, and 40. The temperature drops down quickly during the first
half of hour. The heat transfer reached the steady state after about 6 hours.
7

Vertical co-ordinate (cm)

Frost depth (cm)

0
-1

-2
-3

5
4
3
2
1
0

-4
0

10

20

30

Time (hours)

(a) Frost penetration

40

-5

-4

-3

-2

-1

Temperature (C)

(b) Temperature profile

2004 ABAQUS Users Conference

Vertical co-ordinate (cm)

Vertical co-ordinate (cm)

7
6
5
4
3
2
1
0
0

0.05

0.1

0.15

0.2

0.25

7
6
5
4
3
2
1
0

0.3

0.1

0.15

0.2

0.25

Ice content
(fraction of total volume)

Water content
(fraction of dry weight)

(c) Ice content

(d) Water content

0.3

Figure 2. Results of 1-D simulation.

3.2

Two-dimensional soil freezing problem

The second problem considers a pipeline in a non-frozen terrain, transporting a chilled product,
such as gas. The pipeline is not insulated, and the material of the pipe is ignored altogether. Soil
freezing is expected to take place. The profile of the soil and the pipe is shown in Figure 3(a). Due
to symmetry, only half of the model is considered. Again, plane strain element DC2D4 is used to
discretize the model. The finite element mesh is shown in Figure 3(b). The initial temperature is
0.5C throughout the entire soil mass. The temperature at the boundary of the pipe drops down to
-10C suddenly. Temperature gradients are in both the vertical and horizontal directions. The total
simulation time is 48 days.

(a) Model profile

(b) Finite element mesh

Figure 3. Model profile and finite element mesh.

2005 ABAQUS Users Conference

The contour of temperature distribution on the final day is shown in Figure 4(a). For comparison,
the temperature profile simulated without including the effect of latent heat is shown in Figure
4(b). The frost bulb is much bigger in the latter case, which indicates clearly the influence of latent
heat on frost penetration. The distribution of ice content is shown in Figure 5. The distribution of
unfrozen water content is shown in Figure 6.

(a) With latent heat effect

(b) Without latent heat effect

Figure 4. Temperature distribution.

Figure 5. Ice content distribution.

2004 ABAQUS Users Conference

Figure 6. Unfrozen water content distribution.

4. Remarks
A numeric procedure has been developed, which takes into account the latent heat effect and the
nonlinear thermal behavior of soil. The input parameters are thermal properties of soil, unfrozen
water content function, initial and boundary thermal conditions. Output includes the temperature,
ice content, and water content as function of both time and position. Using the procedure outlined,
difficulties with convergence of the solutions were not encountered. Although no experimental
data are used as verification, the simulation results indicate very realistic behavior of soil
subjected to a freezing process.

5. Acknowledgment
The work presented in this paper was supported by the Army Research Office, grant No.
DAAD19-03-1-0063. This support is greatly appreciated.

6. References
1. Fukuda, M., H. Kim, and Y. Kim, Preliminary Results of Frost Heave Experiments Using
Standard Test Sample Provided by TC8, Proc. Int. Symp. on Ground Freezing and Frost Action
in Soils, Lele, Sweden, pp. 25-30, 1997.
2. Michalowski, R.L., A Constitutive Model of Saturated Soils for Frost Heave Simulations,
Cold Regions Science and Technol., vol. 22, pp. 47-63, 1993.
3. Williams, P.J., and M.W. Smith, The Frozen Earth, Fundamentals of Geocryology, Alden
Press, Oxford, pp. 90, 1989.

2005 ABAQUS Users Conference