Soil Reinforcement Using Coconut Shell Ash: A Case Study of Indian Soil

Abstract

Soil stabilization can be achieved by increasing the density of the soil or by adding admixtures and then applying mechanical work to compact it, is a more economical solution for improving the performance of problematic soils, by enhancing their cementation, and reducing their sensitivity to moisture. Conventionally, cement, lime and fly ash have been used in stabilizing weak soils for construction purposes in order to provide a firm bases for all types of paved areas, to improve foundation conditions, and as a lining for trenches and staked earthwork. In order to make deficient soils useful and meet geotechnical engineering design requirements researchers have focused more on the use of potentially cost effective materials that are locally available from industrial and agricultural waste in order to improve the properties of deficient soils. The present work is aimed at assessing the impact of coconut shell ash on the stabilization of poor soil. For this sand and loamy sand textured soils were considered. This work mainly focused experimental study on the effect of coconut shell ash to increase strength of the soil. Different tests were conducted on soil with varying percentage of coconut shell ash. From the obtained results, it was observed that addition of 0.4% to 0.8% of coconut shell ash showed maximum improvement of dry density and optimum moisture content and also angle of internal friction and cohesion. Therefore coconut shell ash could be used as one of the best waste materials for soil reinforcement under the study area which falls under the district of South Goa in the Taluka of Salcete in India.