Stabilization of Sandy Soil Using Fly Ash and Bentonite

Abstract

Major source of power production in developing countries like India are derived from coal fueled thermal power plants. It has been forecasted that the amount of fly ash in 2031-2032 will go as high as 600 million tons. Such a huge quantity does cause challenging problems, in the form of land usage, health hazards and environmental dangers. Both in disposal as well as in utilization, utmost care has to be taken to safeguard the interest of human life, wild life and environment. Thus environment sound disposal of these bulk amount of wastes is one of the major worries to be dealt with in the present scenario. An ingenious solution which would be effective, efficient and environmentally approved is required to overcome this problem of disposal. So with proper treatment the wastes can be used in many construction aspects like construction of highways, embankments, liner material, fill material etc. It is required to enhance the market appeal of fly ash and waste product by magnifying its potential by adding it with different materials.
In this study, an attempt has been made to evaluate geo-engineering properties of local soil amended with fly ash and suitable proportion of bentonite. The fly ash and soil were collected from Jindal Steel Power limited of Anugul district. The physical and engineering properties of the soil, fly ash, bentonite samples were studied by conducting sieve analysis, hydrometer analysis, light compaction test, UCS test, permeability test, CBR test, direct shear test and consolidation test. The soil was mixed with 10%, 20%, 30% and 40% of fly ash and 5% and10% of Bentonite as a percentage of dry weight of soil. The particular UCS (sealed) and direct shear test samples were cured for 7, 14 and 28 days to evaluate the effect of curing days on strength of fly ash and bentonite stabilized soil. Sealed samples were coated with wax for preventing the samples from outer moisture. Then comparison study has been done between different days of curing for UCS and direct shear test samples with VIII different proportion of fly ash and bentonite. Permeability, consolidation and CBR test for different proportions of fly ash and bentonite has been studied.