Effect of loading due to building construction on liquefaction potential of sand deposits

Liquefaction is one of the most important seismic geotechnical titles and mainly occurs in the non-dense saturated sandy soils during the dynamic loading such as earthquake. The construction of structures on the sand deposits susceptible to liquefaction may prevent liquefaction from occurring or increase the potential and severity of liquefaction. In this study, the FLAC2D software was used for modeling. The liquefaction of the sandy soil mass was studied in three cases: (1) without loading, (2) loading due to the construction of 10- and 20-story buildings, and (3) loading due to the construction of 10-, 15- and 20-story buildings. The results show that by increasing the number of building floors, and consequently, increasing the applied load, the effective depth was increased due to the increase in the amount of effective stress that could decrease the liquefaction potential.