Stress-Deformation-Time Behavior of Dredgings

Current environmental and economical considerations, or both, frequently dictate that maintenance dredgings from harbors and waterways be placed within diked containment areas located near the point of dredging. Since these dredged materials often contain substantial amounts of clay-like particles, organics, and a variety of industrial and agricultural wastes, the potential usefulness of the associated landfills is strongly affected by the load-deformation-time characteristics of the dredgings. Based on a synthesis of data obtained from a 4-yr laboratory and field investigation of several landfills, relationships were established between the deformation properties of these materials over the full spectrum of their depositional history and their classification and index properties. The laboratory program consisted of slurry consolidation tests in 8-in. diam chambers, conventional consolidation tests on slurries and tube samples, and the dependent variables that were considered are the coefficient of volume compressibility, compression index, coefficient of secondary compression, and constrained modulus.