Compressibility of Kaolinitic Clay Contaminated by Ethanol-Gasoline Blends
Publication: Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering
Volume 137, Issue 9
Abstract
In this work, oedometer tests were used to examine the effects of ethanol-gasoline blends on the consolidation characteristics of a kaolinitic soil from northwestern Spain. As the fraction of ethanol in blends increases, the equivalent liquid limit of soil decreases, showing a dividing point for blends containing about 85% of ethanol. By means of a database of compression indexes of remolded clayey soils mixed with differing kinds of alcohol and petroleum hydrocarbon contaminants, a multivariable model for estimating the compression index of the contaminated soil is presented, on the basis of the virgin compression index, normalized liquid limit, and normalized pore fluid viscosity. The model is valid only for percentages of active clays up to 10–15% in weight in kaolinitic soil. The authors would like to encourage others to further validate and refine the approach, which may be useful for preliminary estimation of the compression index of contaminated soils, reducing operators’ risk of inhaling vapors released by the ethanol-gasoline blends while performing the test and also reducing damage to conventional oedometer equipment.
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Acknowledgments
The authors wish to thank the unknown reviewers for their help in improving the article. Special thanks to Prof. Massimo Setti of University of Pavia for mineralogical analysis (X-ray powder diffraction) and Prof. Walter Dragoni and Dr. Massimo Melillo of University of Perugia for having made available an advanced best-fit program. The technical assistance of Giuseppe Vinti and Armando Capuccini is greatly appreciated. This work was financed by ISTEDIL (funding UNSPECIFIEDIST_DM_09).
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering
Volume 137 • Issue 9 • September 2011
Pages: 846 - 849
Copyright
© 2011 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: May 27, 2010
Accepted: Dec 8, 2010
Published online: Dec 10, 2010
Published in print: Sep 1, 2011
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