The environmental sustainability of electrokinetic geosynthetic strengthened slopes

Abstract

Failures of cut and embankment slopes are common and expected to increase. Conventional repair techniques include acquiring additional land, reducing the slope angle, installing drainage improvements, soil nailing and/or providing structural support. All of these methods have technical limitations and most cause considerable environmental disturbance. However, new stabilisation options that are more effective and economical than traditional approaches are becoming available, one of which is electrokinetic geosynthetic treatment of failing or failed slopes. The benefits of electrokinetic geosynthetic treatment in terms of engineering sustainability include reduced cost, reduced ‘carbon dioxide footprint’, fewer heavy goods vehicle movements, zero waste removal, minimal material import, reduced noise and vibrations, improved air quality, preservation of the seed bank and soil environment, minimal vegetation clearance with almost all trees being retained, no visual impacts, no disruption to passing motorists and less damage to root protection areas. Protection of the habitat is also beneficial to nesting birds, amphibians, dormice and reptiles. The paper provides a brief description of the electrokinetic geosynthetic treatment method and illustrates the engineering sustainability with two case histories.

Electrokinetic geosynthetics: from research to hype to practice

“…Reflecting on the developments during that time, electrokinetic geosynthetics technology has followed the trajectory of technology development characterised by the Gartner hype cycle concept of emerging the economic and environmental benefits that electrokinetic geosynthetics can provide. The case histories showed cost savings of 25-30% and reduction in carbon dioxide emissions of 46% when compared with conventional construction techniques (Jones et al, 2014). These benefits are close to the targets identified in the UK government's Construction 2025 industrial strategy (BIS, 2013).…”

Contribution des géosynthétiques au développement durable

“…La durabilité de matériaux et procédés est souvent évaluée en calculant les émissions de carbone. De tels calculs ont été réalisés pour différentes applications des géosynthétiques incluant la filtration (Ehrenberg et al, 2012 ;Laidié et al, 2012), la stabilisation de fondations (Ehrenberg et al, 2012 ;Elsing et al, 2012), la construction de couches drainantes d'ISD (Ehrenberg et al, 2012 ;Werth et al, 2012), de murs renforcés (WRAP, 2010 ;Bouazza et Heerten, 2012 ;Ehrenberg et al, 2012 ;Fraser et al, 2012 ;Damians et al, 2016a, b), de protection sur pente (Heerten, 2012 ;Bouazza et Heerten, 2012), de routes (Heerten, 2012 ;Bouazza et Heerten, 2012), de couverture d'ISD (Bouazza et Heerten, 2012), de traitement électrocinétique (Jones et al, 2014), de construction de ponts (Beauregard et al, 2016). Les résultats de ces études montrent que les solutions avec géosynthétiques ont la plupart du temps une moindre empreinte carbone que les solutions utilisant des matériaux granulaires.…”

Consolidation Assessment of Marine Clay Using Electrokinetic Coupled with Constant Load

“…In the current era of technology, Electro-osmotic (EO) consolidation is a potential technique for accelerated pore pressure dissipation and resulting in the early consolidation of soft soils and dredged sediments with high moisture content, low compressibility, low permeability and low bearing capacity. Based on prior research, electro-osmotic consolidation proved to be an economical and time-saving method for treating low permeable soft soils [7,[12][13][14]. Critical laboratory-scale studies should be performed for field application to predict the feasibility, suitability, availability of resources, cost-effectiveness and time consumption of the process and to anticipate the influence of potential gradient and its effect on the required parameters [4,[15][16][17].…”