Mobile sand barriers for windblown sand mitigation: Effects of plane layout and included angle

Mobile sand barriers are a new type sand-retaining structure that can be moved and arranged according to the engineering demands of sand control. When only used for sand trapping, mobile sand barriers could be arranged in single row. For the dual purposes of sand trapping and sand stabilization, four rows of mobile sand barriers can be arranged in a staggered form. To reveal the effect of plane layout, the included angle between sand barrier direction and wind direction on the characteristics of flow fields and the sand control laws of mobile sand barriers, numerical computations and wind tunnel tests were conducted. The results showed that inflows deflected after passing through staggered arrangement sand barriers due to changes in included angle, and the sand barrier combination exerted successive wind resistance and group blocking effects. An analysis of wind resistance efficiency revealed that the effective protection length of staggered arrangement sand barriers approximately ranged from the sand barrier to 10H on the leeward side (H is sand barrier height), and that the effective protection length of single row sand barriers roughly ranged from 1H on the windward side to 20H on the leeward side. The distribution of sand deposit indicated that the sand interception increased with increasing included angle in staggered arrangement. The wind-breaking and sand-trapping effects were optimal when included angle between sand barrier direction and wind direction is 60°-90°.