Long-Term Hydraulic Conductivity of a Geosynthetic Clay Liner Permeated with Inorganic Salt Solutions
Publication: Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering
Volume 131, Issue 4
Abstract
Hydraulic conductivity tests were conducted on a geosynthetic clay liner (GCL) for more than and as many as 686 pore volumes of flow (PVF) using single-species salt solutions (NaCl, KCl, or ) to (1) evaluate how the long-term hydraulic conductivity is affected by cation concentration and valence and (2) demonstrate the relevance and importance of termination criteria when measuring hydraulic conductivity of GCLs to salt solutions. Permeation with solutions resulted in an increase in the hydraulic conductivity of 1 order of magnitude or more. The rate at which these changes occurred depended on concentration, with slower changes (years and hundreds of PVF) occurring for weaker solutions. In contrast, permeation with NaCl or KCl solutions or de-ionized (DI) water resulted in no appreciable change in hydraulic conductivity, regardless of the duration of permeation or number of pore volumes of flow. Hydraulic conductivities determined in accordance with ASTM D 5084 and D 6766 ( and ) equaled when the permeant solution contained NaCl, KCl, or was a strong solution. In contrast, when the permeant liquid was a weak solution, and were 2–13 times lower than . Closer agreement between and was obtained for weak solutions when the electrical conductivity ratio criterion was tightened to . Hydraulic conductivities obtained after comparable influent and effluent concentrations of the permeant salt %) were approximately lower than for weak solutions. Hydraulic conductivities equal to were obtained from the tests permeated with weak solutions only when Na was no longer eluted at detectable levels.
Get full access to this article
View all available purchase options and get full access to this article.
Acknowledgments
Support for this study was provided by the United States National Science Foundation under Grant No. CMS-9900336 to the University of Wisconsin–Madison and Grant No. CMS-9820863 to Colorado State University. The opinions expressed in this paper are solely those of the writers and are not necessarily consistent with the policies or opinions of the NSF.
References
American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM. (2002a). Annual book of standards, Vol. 04.08, ASTM International, West Conshohocken, Pa.
American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM. (2002b). Annual book of standards, Vol. 04.13, ASTM International, West Conshohocken, Pa.
American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM. (2002c). Annual book of standards, Vol. 11.01, ASTM International, West Conshohocken, Pa.
Benson, C., and Wang, X. (2000). “Hydraulic conductivity assessment of hydraulic barriers constructed with paper sludge.” Geotechnics of high water content materials STP 1374, T. Edil and P. Fox, eds., ASTM, West Conshohocken, Pa., 91–107.
Berthouex, P., and Brown, L. (2002). Statistics for environmental engineers, 2nd Ed., Lewis Publishers, Boca Raton, Fla.
Bowders, J. (1988). “Discussion of Termination criteria for clay permeability testing.” J. Geotech. Eng., 114(8), 947–949.
Daniel, D. (1994). “State-of-the-art: Laboratory hydraulic conductivity tests for saturated soils,” Hydraulic conductivity and waste contaminant transport in soil STP 1142, D. Daniel and S. Trautwein, eds., ASTM, West Conshohocken, Pa., 30–78.
Daniel, D., Bowders, J., and Gilbert, R. (1997). “Laboratory hydraulic conductivity testing of GCLs in flexible-wall permeameters.” Testing and acceptance criteria for geosynthetic clay liners, STP 1308, L. Well, ed., ASTM, West Conshohocken, Pa., 208–226.
Dennis, M. and Turner, J. (1998). “Hydraulic conductivity of compacted soil treated with biofilm.” J. Geotech. Geoenviron. Eng., 124(2), 120–127.
Draper, N., and Smith, H. (1998). Applied regression analysis, 3rd Ed., Wiley, New York.
Dunn, R., and Mitchell, J. (1984). “Fluid conductivity testing of fine-grained soils.” J. Geotech. Eng., 110(11), 1648–1665.
Egloffstein, T. (1995). “Properties and test methods to assess bentonite used in geosynthetic clay liners.” Geosynthetic clay liners, Balkema, Rotterdam, The Netherlands, 51–72.
Egloffstein, T. (1997). ’Geosynthetic clay liners, Part Six: Ion exchange.” Geotechnical Fabrics Rep., Vol. 15, No. 5, 38–43.
Egloffstein, T. (2001). “Natural bentonites–influence of the ion exchange and partial desiccation on permeability and self-healing capacity of bentonites used in GCLs.” Geotext. Geomembr., 19, 427–444.
Gilbert, M., and Laudelout, H. (1965). “Exchange properties of hydrogen ions in clays.” Soil Sci., 100(3), 157–162.
Gleason, M., Daniel, D., and Eykholt, G. (1997). “Calcium and sodium bentonite for hydraulic containment applications.” J. Geotech. Geoenviron. Eng., 123(5), 438–445.
Grim, R. (1968). Clay mineralogy, 2nd Ed., McGraw–Hill, New York.
Imamura, S., Sueoka, T., and Kamon, M. (1996). “Long-term stability of bentonite/sand mixtures at L.L.R.W. storage.” Proc., 2nd Int. Congress on Environmental Geotechnics, M. Kamon, ed., Balkema, Rotterdam, The Netherlands, 545–550.
Jo, H. (2003). “Cation exchange and hydraulic conductivity of geosynthetic clay liners (GCLs) permeated with inorganic salt solutions.” PhD dissertation, Univ. of Wisconsin, Madison, Wis.
Jo, H., Benson, C., and Edil, T. (2004). “Hydraulic conductivity and cation exchange in non-prehydrated and prehydrated bentonite permeated with weak inorganic salt solutions.” Clays Clay Miner., 52(6), 661–679.
Jo, H., Katsumi, T., Benson, C., and Edil, T. (2001). “Hydraulic conductivity and swelling of nonprehydrated GCLs with single-species salt solutions.” J. Geotech. Geoenviron. Eng., 127(7), 557–567.
Kamon, M., Zhang, H., Katsumi, T., and Sawa, N. (2002). “Redox effect on the hydraulic conductivity of clay liners.” Soils Found., 42(6), 79–91.
Koerner, R. (1997). Designing with geosynthetics, 4th Ed., Prentice–Hall, Englewood Cliffs, N.J.
Kolstad, D., Benson, C., and Edil, T. (2004). “Hydraulic conductivity and swell of nonprehydrated GCLs permeated with multispecies inorganic solutions.” J. Geotech. Geoenviron. Eng., 130(12), 1236–1249.
Lee, J. (2004). “Long-term performance of geosynthetic clay liners subjected to inorganic salt solutions.” PhD dissertation, Colorado State Univ., Fort Collins, Colo.
McBride, M. (1994). Environmental chemistry of soils, Oxford University Press, New York.
Mesri, G., and Olson, R. (1971). “Mechanisms controlling the permeability of clays.” Clays Clay Miner., 19, 151–158.
Mitchell, J. (1993). Fundamentals of soil behavior, 2nd Ed., Wiley, New York.
Nelson, M. (2000). “Hydraulic conductivity of paper sludges.” MS thesis, Univ. of Wisconsin–Madison., Madison, Wis.
Peirce, J., and Witter, K. (1986). “Termination criteria for clay permeability testing.” J. Geotech. Eng., 112(9), 841–854.
Petrov, R., and Rowe, R. (1997). “Geosynthetic clay liner (GCL)—Chemical compatibility by hydraulic conductivity testing and factors impacting its performance.” Can. Geotech. J., 34, 863–885.
Petrov, R., Rowe, R., and Quigley, R. (1997). “Comparison of laboratory-measured GCL hydraulic conductivity based on three permeameter types.” Geotech. Test. J., 20(1), 49–62.
Quaranta, J., Gabr, M., and Bowders, J. (1997). “First-exposure performance of the bentonite component of a GCL in a low-pH, calcium-enriched environment.” STP 1308, ASTM, West Conshohocken, Pa., 162–177.
Rhoades, J. (1982a). “Cation exchange capacity.” Methods of soil analysis, Part 2 Chemical and microbiological properties, 2nd Ed., A. Page, R. Miller, and D. Keeney, eds., Chap. 8, Soil Science Society of America, Madison, Wis., 149–157.
Rhoades, J. (1982b). “Soluble salts.” Methods of soil analysis, Part 2 Chemical and microbiological properties, 2nd Ed., A. Page, R. Miller, and D. Keeney, eds., Chap. 10, Soil Science Society of America, Madison, Wis., 67–179.
Ruhl, J., and Daniel, D. (1997). “Geosynthetic clay liners permeated with chemical solutions and leachates.” J. Geotech. Geoenviron. Eng., 123(4), 369–381.
Shackelford, C. (1994). “Waste–soil interactions that alter hydraulic conductivity.” ASTM STP 1142, ASTM, Philadelphia, 111–168.
Shackelford, C., Benson, C., Katsumi, T., Edil, T., and Lin, L. (2000). “Evaluating the hydraulic conductivity of GCLs permeated with non-standard liquids.” Geotext. Geomembr.18(2–4), 133–162.
Shackelford, C., Malusis, D., Majeski, M., and Stern, R. (1999). “Electrical conductivity breakthrough curves.” J. Geotech. Geoenviron. Eng., 125(4), 260–270.
Shan, H., and Lai, Y. (2002). “Effect of hydrating liquid on the hydraulic properties of geosynthetic clay liners.” Geotext. Geomembr. 20, 19–38.
Stumm, W., and Morgan, J. (1996). Aquatic chemistry, 3rd Ed., Wiley, New York.
Thomas, G. (1982). “Exchangeable cations.” Methods of soil analysis, Part 2 Chemical and microbiological properties, 2nd Ed., A. Page, R. Miller, and D. Keeney, eds., Chap. 9, Soil Science Society of America, Madison, Wis., 159–165.
van Olphen, H. (1991). An introduction to clay colloid chemistry, 2nd Ed., Krieger, Malabar, Fla.
Vasko, S., Jo, H., Benson, C., Edil, T., and Katsumi, T. (2001). “Hydraulic conductivity of partially prehydrated geosynthetic clay liners permeated with aqueous calcium chloride solutions.” Proc., Geosynthetics 2001, Industrial Fabrics Assoc. International, St. Paul, Minn., 685–699.
Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Copyright
© 2005 ASCE.
History
Received: Sep 11, 2003
Accepted: Aug 9, 2004
Published online: Apr 1, 2005
Published in print: Apr 2005
Authors
Metrics & Citations
Metrics
Citations
Download citation
If you have the appropriate software installed, you can download article citation data to the citation manager of your choice. Simply select your manager software from the list below and click Download.