Soil Improvement is Necessary to Many Major Construction Projects

Soil improvement is an important part of land reclamation. It is implemented to prevent the excessive settlement of land that has been reclaimed for construction purposes. It is also used to enhance the stiffness of the soil, so that there is no liquefaction of the soil and no damage to the structures that maybe constructed in seismic-sensitive regions.

Soil improvement is also done to immobilize or stabilize contaminants in dredged soil so that there are no environmental impacts. Soil improvement is often one in earthquake prone regions. This is because the seismic activities can be threatening to maritime construction.

Why are soil improvement techniques necessary?

In case of lands that are reclaimed, the process of soil stabilization will take about a decade or even more. But given the fact that there is an urgent need for expansion, it is not possible to wait for that long to begin the construction work. Indeed, if constructors need to wait till the land has settled, the whole project progress is threatened, and this can lead to major financial repercussions. As such, it is always more practical and financially viable that the land is artificially improved. A number of techniques have been have been developed to stabilize the land like prefabricated vertical drains or PVDs, High energy impact compaction (which is used to compact the top 2 to 3 meters of a new land), in-situ soil mixing or cement deep mixing methods.

Advantages of soil improvement

There are a number of soil improvement methods and some of these methods also provide a cost effective means of reducing soil contamination. Dewatering contaminated soil can be a good thing for two reasons. Firstly, the improved soil can be used for construction. Secondly, when additives like cement and the like are used for the improvement of the soil, the additives serve to increase the bearing capacity of the soil for construction and also immobilize contaminated marine sediments.

Soil stabilization

Soil solidification is a technique that is used to reclaim a land that has been contaminated. Sometimes it merely pertains to a clean up work in construction, or as a part of a redevelopment project. Elements like Portland cement, along with fly ash, cement kiln, lime kiln dust are used as bonding agents in the oil solidification process – which is used to stabilize and sometimes even change the physical property of a number of hazardous materials. If the right combination is used in the soil, the very structural property of the land site will improve. Some of the specific treatment of the soil stabilization process will include encapsulating the waste particles, chemically fixing the hazardous elements in the soil as well as binding free liquids in waste materials and also helping in the reduction of the toxicity of the contaminants.