Long-term highwall stability in the northwestern Powder River basin, Wyoming and Montana

Time-dependent behavior of natural and and excavated slopes in sedimentary rocks is a subject that is poorly understood at present but that is now an important consideration in the design, operation, and reclamation of energy-extraction facilities, in part because of the environmental considerations mandated by the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act of 1977 (Public Law 95-87.)

A slide in an abandoned, unreclaimed strip mine northwest of Sheridan, Wyoming, has been analyzed as an example of a long-term slop failure in the region. This slide occurred in early 1975, some 20 years after cessation of mining. This investigation used Spencer's limiting equilibruim method and an elastic-plastic finite element method incorporating the Drucker-Prager yield criterion.