Natural frost in improvement of construction properties of ground in hydroengineering and industrial and civilian construction

Artificial freezing of ground by refrigerating machines requires considerable power and expense, so it is comparatively seldom applied and almost always for a short period. In the regions of severe climate, seasonal freezing and long-term preservation of low temperatures in a mass of frozen ground can compete in effectiveness and economy with the traditional methods of loose ground stabilization, quicksand and boggy—clayey deposits, in particular. In practice, different methods and systems are applied for freezing the ground using the cold atmosphere air as a heat-absorbing medium. Systems with forced pumping of the intermediate heat carrier or of the air itself are more economic than machine freezing, but they are unreliable and maintenance is very expensive. Freezing devices using natural circulation of a single-phase and double-phase heat carrier in hermetically sealed cavities or thermosiphons permit effective control of the temperature regime of the ground in the seasonal and annual cycles of temperature variation of the ground and atmosphere air with the minimum operating expense. The paper considers the operational features of freezing systems and different devices, and gives examples of the utilization of artificially frozen ground in hydraulic structures and in foundations of industrial buildings and dwelling houses. The possibility of creating artificially frozen masses used as foundations of the structures built in severe climatic regions is considered, and examples of the existing buildings constructed on the artificial lenses of frozen ground are given.