Effects of Calcium Nitrate on Thermal Hysteresis and Corresponding Freezing Characteristics of Silty Sand Mixtures
Publication: Journal of Materials in Civil Engineering
Volume 35, Issue 9
Abstract
This research paper presents the results and analysis obtained via the evaluation of calcium nitrate as an effective stabilizer to alter the thermal properties as well as improve the compressive strength of frost-susceptible soil. Two silty sand soils with 15% and 25% fines content that are categorized as high to very high frost-susceptible soil were considered and treated with varying dosages of calcium nitrate contents (1.5%, 3.0%, 4.5%, 10%, 15%, and 20% of soil weight). The thermal properties, including thermal hysteresis, thermal conductivity, specific heat capacity, freezing point depression, and phase changes (freezing and thawing point) were determined for the untreated and treated soil samples. It was observed that the treated samples’ thermal properties were significantly altered with respect to untreated soils. The effects of fines content on the thermal properties were evaluated using a stabilizer–silt content ratio. The threshold calcium nitrate dosage content was established, and a new correlation was established to evaluate the freezing point and thawing point. The unconfined compressive strength (UCS) tests performed on the treated soils depicted a significant increase in compressive strength compared to the untreated soil. Further analysis showed that fines content has a significant role to play on the compressive strength of treated silty sand. A qualitative analysis performed on images from a scanning electron microscope (SEM) showed that increasing the calcium nitrate dosage reduced the pore size and improved the cementation between the sand and silt grains.
Get full access to this article
View all available purchase options and get full access to this article.
Data Availability Statement
All data, models, and code generated or used during the study appear in the published paper.
References
Antar, M. A., A. Bilton, J. Blanco, and G. Zaragoza. 2012. “Solar desalination.” In Annual review of heat transfer, 15. Danbury, CT: Begell House.
Arabi, M., S. Wild, and G. Rowlands. 1989. “Frost resistance of lime-stabilized clay soil.” Transp. Res. Rec. (1219): 93–102.
ASTM. 2000. Standard test methods for liquid limit, plastic limit, and plasticity index of soils. ASTM D4318-00. West Conshohocken, PA: ASTM.
ASTM. 2006. Standard test method for unconfined compressive strength of cohesive soil. ASTM D2166-06. West Conshohocken, PA: ASTM.
ASTM. 2007. Standard test method for particle-size analysis of soils. ASTM D422-63. West Conshohocken, PA: ASTM.
ASTM. 2008. Standard test method for determination of thermal conductivity of soil and soft rock by thermal needle probe procedure. ASTM D5334-08. West Conshohocken, PA: ASTM.
ASTM. 2012. Standard test methods for laboratory compaction characteristics of soil using modified effort (56,000 ft-lbf/ft3 (2,700 kN-m/m3)). ASTM D1557-12. West Conshohocken, PA: ASTM.
Baker, G., and J. Berg. 1983. “Reducing frost heave by electro-osmotic dewatering and soil chemical treatment.” Northern Eng. 15 (4): 10–15.
Becker, B. R., A. Misra, and B. A. Fricke. 1992. “Development of correlations for soil thermal conductivity.” Int. Commun. Heat Mass Transfer 19 (1): 59–68. https://doi.org/10.1016/0735-1933(92)90064-O.
Bentzen, G., A. T. Smith, D. Bennett, N. J. Webster, F. Reinholt, E. Sletholt, and J. Hobson. 1995. “Controlled dosing of nitrate for prevention of H2S in a sewer network and the effects on the subsequent treatment processes.” Water Sci. Technol. 31 (7): 293–302. https://doi.org/10.2166/wst.1995.0245.
Bing, H., and W. Ma. 2011. “Laboratory investigation of the freezing point of saline soil.” Cold Reg. Sci. Technol. 67 (1–2): 79–88. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.coldregions.2011.02.008.
Casagrande, A. 1931. “Discussion of frost heaving.” In Vol. 11 of Proc., Highway Research Board, 168–172. Washington, DC: National Research Council.
Chabbi, A., C. Rumpel, P. M. Grootes, J. A. González-Pérez, R. D. Delaune, F. Gonzalez-Vila, B. Nixdorf, and R. F. Hüttl. 2006. “Lignite degradation and mineralization in lignite-containing mine sediment as revealed by 14C activity measurements and molecular analysis.” Org. Geochem. 37 (8): 957–976. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.orggeochem.2006.02.002.
Edgar, T. V., R. Mathis, T. McGary, and J. C. Potter. 2014. Frost heave mitigation using structural polymer injection. Washington, DC: Transportation Research Board.
Farouki, O. T. 1981. “The thermal properties of soils in cold regions.” Cold Reg. Sci. Technol. 5 (1): 67–75. https://doi.org/10.1097/SS.0b013e31816d1e75.
FHWA (Federal Highway Administration). 2006. Geotechnical aspects of pavements reference manual. Washington, DC: FHWA.
Gieselman, H., J. L. Heitman, and R. Horton. 2008. “Effect of a hydrophobic layer on the upward movement of water under surface-freezing conditions.” Soil Sci. 173 (5): 297–305. https://doi.org/10.1097/SS.0b013e31816d1e75.
Grechishchev, S., A. Instanes, J. Sheshin, A. Pavlov, and O. Grechishcheva. 2001. “Laboratory investigation of the freezing point of oil-polluted soils.” Cold Reg. Sci. Technol. 32 (2–3): 183–189. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0165-232X(01)00030-1.
Guthrie, W. S., R. D. Lay, and A. J. Birdsall. 2007. “Effect of reduced cement contents on frost heave of silty soil: Laboratory testing and numerical modeling.” In Vol. 17 of Proc., Transportation Research Board 86th Annual Meeting Compendium of Papers. Washington, DC: Transportation Research Board.
Haynes, F. D., D. L. Carbee, and D. Vanpelt. 1980. Thermal diffusivity of frozen soil. Fort Belvoir, VA: Defense Technical Information Center.
Hennion, F. 1955. “Frost and permafrost definitions.” Highw. Res. Board Bull. (111): 107–110.
Hillel, D. 2013. Introduction to soil physics. Amsterdam, Netherlands: Elsevier.
Jumikis, A. R. 1966. Thermal soil mechanics. Wuhan, China: Scientific Research Publishing.
Justnes, H., and E. C. Nygaard. 1995. “Technical calcium nitrate as set accelerator for cement at low temperatures.” Cem. Concr. Res. 25 (8): 1766–1774. https://doi.org/10.1016/0008-8846(95)00172-7.
Karagöl, F., R. Demirboğa, M. A. Kaygusuz, M. M. Yadollahi, and R. Polat. 2013. “The influence of calcium nitrate as antifreeze admixture on the compressive strength of concrete exposed to low temperatures.” Cold Reg. Sci. Technol. 89 (May): 30–35. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.coldregions.2013.02.001.
Kersten, M. S. 1949. Thermal properties of soils. Minneapolis: Univ. of Minnesota.
Khan, A., D. Mrawira, and E. E. Hildebrand. 2009. “Use of lightweight aggregate to mitigate frost damage in flexible pavements.” Int. J. Pavement Eng. 10 (5): 329–339. https://doi.org/10.1080/10298430802169473.
Kozlowski, T. 2009. “Some factors affecting supercooling and the equilibrium freezing point in soil–water systems.” Cold Reg. Sci. Technol. 59 (1): 25–33. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.coldregions.2009.05.009.
Kozlowski, T. 2016. “A simple method of obtaining the soil freezing point depression, the unfrozen water content and the pore size distribution curves from the DSC peak maximum temperature.” Cold Reg. Sci. Technol. 122 (Feb): 18–25. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.coldregions.2015.10.009.
Lovell, C. Jr. 1957. “Temperature effects on phase composition and strength of partially-frozen soil.” Highw. Res. Board Bull. (168): 74–95.
Low, P. F., D. M. Anderson, and P. Hoekstra. 1968. “Some thermodynamic relationships for soils at or below the freezing point: 1. Freezing point depression and heat capacity.” Water Resour. Res. 4 (2): 379–394. https://doi.org/10.1029/WR004i002p00379.
Miller, R. D. 1972. “Freezing and heaving of saturated and unsaturated soils.” Highway Res. Rec. 393 (1): 1–11.
Noborio, K., and K. McInnes. 1993. “Thermal conductivity of salt-affected soils.” Soil Sci. Soc. Am. J. 57 (2): 329–334. https://doi.org/10.2136/sssaj1993.03615995005700020007x.
Penner, E. 1959. “The mechanism of frost heaving in soils.” Highway Res. Board Bull. (225): 1–22.
Polat, R. 2016. “The effect of antifreeze additives on fresh concrete subjected to freezing and thawing cycles.” Cold Reg. Sci. Technol. 127 (Jul): 10–17. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.coldregions.2016.04.008.
Rahman, R., and T. V. Bheemasetti. 2021. “Evaluation studies on freezing point depression of stabilized frost-susceptible soil.” In Proc., IFCEE 2021, 203–212. Reston, VA: ASCE. https://doi.org/doi:10.1061/9780784483411.020.
Sarsembayeva, A., and P. E. Collins. 2017. “Evaluation of frost heave and moisture/chemical migration mechanisms in highway subsoil using a laboratory simulation method.” Cold Reg. Sci. Technol. 133 (Jan): 26–35. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.coldregions.2016.10.003.
Schärli, U., and L. Rybach. 2001. “Determination of specific heat capacity on rock fragments.” Geothermics 30 (1): 93–110. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0375-6505(00)00035-3.
Spaans, E. J., and J. M. Baker. 1996. “The soil freezing characteristic: Its measurement and similarity to the soil moisture characteristic.” Soil Sci. Soc. Am. J. 60 (1): 13–19. https://doi.org/10.2136/sssaj1996.03615995006000010005x.
Tabassum, T., R. Rahman, and T. V. Bheemasetti. 2022. “Thermal-mechanical properties of stabilized clayey sand subgrade soils.” Transp. Geotech. 37 (Nov): 100880. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.trgeo.2022.100880.
Takagi, S. 1980. “The adsorption force theory of frost heaving.” Cold Reg. Sci. Technol. 3 (1): 57–81. https://doi.org/10.1016/0165-232X(80)90007-5.
Van Wijk, W. R., and D. De Vries. 1963. “Periodic temperature variations in a homogeneous soil.” In Physics of Plant Environment, 103–143. Amsterdam, Netherlands: North Holland Publishing Company.
Wang, C., Y. Lai, F. Yu, and S. Li. 2018. “Estimating the freezing-thawing hysteresis of chloride saline soils based on the phase transition theory.” Appl. Therm. Eng. 135 (May): 22–33. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.applthermaleng.2018.02.039.
Watanabe, K., and M. Mizoguchi. 2002. “Amount of unfrozen water in frozen porous media saturated with solution.” Cold Reg. Sci. Technol. 34 (2): 103–110. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0165-232X(01)00063-5.
Wenwu, C., L. Ü. Haimin, C. Kai, and W. Guopeng. 2014. “Influence on strength of site soils about chlorine and sulfate salt in dry environment.” J. Eng. Geol. 22 (s1): 333–338. https://doi.org/10.13544/j.cnki.jeg.2014.s1.056.
Yan, X., L. Chen, Q. You, and Q. Fu. 2019. “Experimental analysis of thermal conductivity of semi-rigid base asphalt pavement.” Road Mater. Pavement Des. 20 (5): 1215–1227. https://doi.org/10.1080/14680629.2018.1431147.
Yu, X., N. Zhang, A. Pradhan, and A. J. Puppala. 2016. “Thermal conductivity of sand–kaolin clay mixtures.” Environ. Geotech. 3 (4): 190–202. https://doi.org/10.1680/jenge.15.00022.
Zhang, T., R. G. Barry, K. Knowles, J. Heginbottom, and J. Brown. 1999. “Statistics and characteristics of permafrost and ground-ice distribution in the Northern Hemisphere.” Polar Geogr. 23 (2): 132–154. https://doi.org/10.1080/10889379909377670.
Zhang, Y. 2014. “Thermal-hydro-mechanical model for freezing and thawing of soils.” Ph.D. thesis, Dept. of Civil Engineering, Univ. of Michigan.
Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Materials in Civil Engineering
Volume 35 • Issue 9 • September 2023
Copyright
© 2023 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Jul 9, 2022
Accepted: Jan 18, 2023
Published online: Jun 17, 2023
Published in print: Sep 1, 2023
Discussion open until: Nov 17, 2023
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.