A New Analytical Solution for Determination of Acceptable Overall Settlement of Heap Leaching Structures Foundation

There are some artificial and natural materials on foundation of heap leaching structures. Geomembrane liner is the most important artificial isolated layer of these structures, which its thickness is about 1 to 2 mm. Foundation overall settlement of such structures changes the primary length of the geomembrane layer. If the strain of geomembrane become more than the allowable one, the layer will be failed and acid will leak out of the heap foundation. In this paper, foundation of the heap leaching structures is modeled with a hyperbolic curve and the length of geomembrane liner is determined before and after loading. Next, acceptable overall settlement of heap foundation is computed according to the allowable strain of geomembrane materials. Then, a design chart is presented for quick estimation of acceptable overall settlement of these structures. Finally, the abovementioned approach is utilized to determine foundation overall settlement of the Tarom heap leaching structure as a case study. The analysis shows that geomembrane liner of this case will not be failed due to the foundation overall settlement.