The fragile habitat of alpine mining areas can be greatly affected by surface disturbances caused by mining activities, particularly open‐pit mining activities, which greatly affect the periglacial environment. SBAS‐InSAR technology enables the processing of SAR images to obtain highly accurate surface deformation information. This paper applied SBAS‐InSAR technology to obtain three years of surface subsidence information based on the 89‐scene Sentinel‐1A SLC products, covering a mining area (tailings and active areas) in the Tianshan Mountains and its surroundings from 25^th December 2017 to 2^nd January 2021. The data were adopted to analyze the characteristics of deformation in the study region and the mining areas, and the subsidence accumulation was compared with field GNSS observation results to verify its accuracy. The results showed that the study area settled significantly, with a maximum settlement rate of −44.80 mm/a and a maximum uplift rate of 28.04 mm/a. The maximum settlement and accumulation of the whole study area over the three‐year period were −129.39 mm and 60.49 mm, respectively. The mining area had a settlement value of over 80 mm over the three years. Significantly, the settlement rates of the tailings and active areas were −35 mm/a and −40 mm/a, respectively. Debris accumulation in the eastern portion of the tailings and active areas near the mountain was serious, with accumulation rates of 25 mm/a and 20 mm/a, respectively, and both had accumulation amounts of around 70 mm. For mine tailing pile areas with river flows, the pile locations and environmental restoration should be appropriately adjusted at a later stage. For gravel pile areas, regular cleaning should be carried out, especially around the mining site and at the tunnel entrances and exits, and long‐term deformation monitoring of these areas should be carried out to ensure safe operation of the mining site. The SBAS‐InSAR measurements were able to yield deformations with high accuracies over a wide area and cost less human and financial resources than the GNSS measurement method. Furthermore, the measurement results were more macroscopic, with great application value for surface subsidence monitoring in alpine areas.

Against the background of global warming, permafrost areas are facing increasing thawing, and the threat to the surface of the Qinghai–Tibet Engineering Corridor (QTEC) is serious. It is imperative to understand the current surface deformation and analyze the changes spatiotemporal characteristics for future warnings. At present, observation of a long time series and overall coverage of vertical ground deformation in QTEC are lacking. This paper takes the permafrost deformation of the QTEC as its research object. It uses the pretreated LiCSAR product and combines it with the LiCSBAS package to obtain monitoring results of the long time series deformation of the engineering corridor’s surface. The SAR image acquisition date is taken as the constraint, the results covering the whole processing area are selected, and then the vertical deformation information covering the entire engineering corridor area by ignoring the north–south displacement is calculated. The results show that the surface of the study area, as a whole, slightly subsided between May 2017 and March 2022, and the vertical deformation rate was mostly distributed at −27.068 mm/yr − 18.586 mm/yr, with an average of −1.06 mm/yr. Vertical deformation dominated at 52.84 percent of the study area, of which settlement accounted for 27.57 percent and uplift accounted for 25.27 percent. According to the statistics of the normal distribution of deformation velocity per pixel, a total of 77% of the engineering corridor was stable, with a vertical deformation rate between −6.964 mm/yr and −4.844 mm/yr, and 17.7% of the region was sub-stable, with a settling rate of −12.868 mm/yr − –6.964 mm/yr. The unstable regions included areas with settlement rates greater than 12.868 mm/yr and uplift rates greater than 10.748 mm/yr, representing 4.4 percent and 0.9 percent of the total area, respectively, for a total of 5.3 percent. The results of this paper can be used as the theoretical basis and as basic data for decision making and scientific research in various departments, and they are of great significance for surface stability assessment and early warnings along engineering corridors and traffic projects.

The China–Russia crude oil pipeline (CRCOP) traverses rivers, forests, and mountains over permafrost regions in northeastern China. Water accumulates beside the pipe embankment, which disturbs the hydrothermal balance of permafrost underlying the pipeline. Ground surface flows along the pipeline erode the pipe embankment, which threatens the CRCOP’s operational safety. Additionally, frost heave and thaw settlement can induce differential deformation of the pipes. Therefore, it is necessary to acquire the spatial distribution of water features along the CRCOP, and analyze the various hazard probabilities and their controlling factors. In this paper, information regarding the permafrost type, buried depth of the pipe, soil type, landforms, and vegetation were collected along the CRCOP every 2 km. Ponding and erosive damage caused by surface flows were measured via field investigations and remote sensing images. Two hundred and sixty-four pond sites were extracted from Landsat 8 images, in which the areas of 46.8% of the ponds were larger than 500 m². Several influential factors related to freeze–thaw hazards and erosive damage were selected and put into a logistic regression model to determine their corresponding risk probabilities. The results reflected the distributions, and forecasted the occurrences, of freeze–thaw hazards and erosive damage. The sections of pipe with the highest risks of freeze–thaw and erosive damage accounted for 2.4% and 6.7%, respectively, of the pipeline. Permafrost type and the position where runoff encounters the pipeline were the dominant influences on the freeze–thaw hazards, while the runoff–pipe position, buried depth of the pipe, and landform types played a dominant role in erosive damage along the CRCOP. Combined with the geographic information system (GIS), field surveys, image interpretation and model calculations are effective methods for assessing the various hazards along the CRCOP in permafrost regions.

Diatomite is a siliceous sedimentary rock containing amorphous silica, which can be used as a green mineral admixture to improve the properties of concrete. This study investigates the affecting mechanism of diatomite on concrete performance by macro and micro tests. The results indicate that diatomite can reduce the fluidity of concrete mixture and change its water absorption, compressive strength, resistance to chloride penetration (RCP), porosity, and microstructure. The low fluidity of concrete mixture containing diatomite can reduce workability. With increasing diatomite as partial replacement for cement in concrete, water absorption of concrete decreases before increasing, while compressive strength and RCP rise first and then drop. When diatomite is added to the cement at a content of 5% by weight, the concrete has the lowest water absorption and the highest compressive strength and RCP. Through the mercury intrusion porosimetry (MIP) test, we determined that the addition of 5% diatomite reduces the porosity of concrete from 12.68% to 10.82% and changes the proportion of pores with different sizes in concrete, the proportion of harmless and less harmful pores increases, and the proportion of harmful pores reduces. Based on the microstructure analysis, the SiO₂ in diatomite can react with CH and produce C-S-H. C-S-H is responsible for developing concrete because it fills pores and cracks, forms a platy structure, and makes the concrete much denser, thereby improving its macroscopic performance and microstructure.

The block-stone embankment is a special type of embankment widely used to protect the stability of the underlying warm and ice-rich permafrost. Under the influence of multiple factors, certain damages will still occur in the block-stone embankment after a period of operation, which may weaken or destroy its cooling function, introducing more serious damages to the Qinghai–Tibet Highway (QTH). Ground-penetrating radar (GPR), a nondestructive testing technique, was adopted to investigate the damage properties of the damaged block-stone embankment. GPR imagery, together with the other data and methods (structural characteristics, field survey data, GPR parameters, etc.), indicated four categories of damage: (i) loosening of the upper sand-gravel layer; (ii) loosening of the block-stone layer; (iii) settlement of the block-stone layer; and (iv) dense filling of the block-stones layer. The first two conditions were widely distributed, whereas the settlement and dense filling of the block-stone layer were less so, and the other combined damages also occurred frequently. The close correlation between the different damages indicated a causal relationship. A preliminary discussion of these observations about the influences on the formation of the damage of the block-stone embankment is included. The findings provide some points of reference for the future construction and maintenance of block-stone embankments in permafrost regions.