Occurrence of high-permeability fracture estimated by grouting in Horonobe URL of Japan

Tokiwa, Tetsuya; Sawada, Sumiyuki; Ochiai, Shoji; Miyakawa, Kazuya   

In the Horonobe area of Japan, underground facilities have been excavated in soft sedimentary rocks in order to enhance the reliability of relevant technologies for geological disposal of high-level radioactive waste in Japan. Pre-excavation grouting was carried out at 250 to 380 m depth at the location of the planned Ventilation Shaft. After the grouting, the shaft was excavated from 250 to 350 m depth, and fracture mapping was carried out to understand the characteristics of water conductive fractures by focusing on the occurrence of injected grout. Fractures consist mainly of shear fractures, and extension fractures and faults are observed in the shaft. The faults are associated with fault rocks and high continuity. Grout was mainly observed in fractures located on the branching part from faults rather than the fault itself, and therefore high-permeability fractures are not the fault itself (fault core) but fractures located on the branching part in the damage zone of the fault.