Natural variability of shear strength in a granite residual soil from Porto

The
renewal imposed by the Eurocodes regarding the methodologies of safety
evaluation requires a statistical analysis of the variability of ground
geotechnical parameters. However, the studies published in the reviewed
literature do not cover the typical materials from the northeast region
of Portugal—residual soils from granite—to which a strong heterogeneity
is associated. Hence, a statistical characterization of the natural
variability of a granite residual soil from Porto has been made through a
significant amount of experimental tests, focusing on its geomechanical
properties. In order to provide a database for probabilistic analysis
of problems involving this type of soils, an appropriate statistical law
has been used to model its variability, which has been quantified by
means of coefficients of variation and scales of fluctuation.