Case study on soil-reinforced embankment slope stability with natural fibre additives

Abstract

In this work, an attempt was made to study the influence of jute fibre reinforcement with the help of three case studies. The first case study described laboratory model testing and numerical analysis performed on a modelled slope that simulated an existing embankment that failed on many occasions following overnight heavy rainfall. The second case study discussed how vegetation may minimise the likelihood of soil separation and the velocity of surface run-off by decreasing surficial soil erosion. Jute geotextiles have excellent hydrophilic characteristics that aid plant development; for this reason, they were used in the case study. The third case study developed a multi-fibre approach to traditional geotextiles to create an eco-sustainable product(s) with superior geotechnical qualities for improving the efficiency of earthen structures using soft revetments. The conclusion of these case studies expressed the novel objective of improvement of embankments with stability analysis. This research also involved soil sample testing and numerical modelling using the GeoStudio software suite. The slope model considers reinforcement with different numbers of rows of jute tassels on the embankment for enhanced stability and factor of safety. The presence of jute fibre geotextiles results in better performance in the stabilisation of soil and the minimum value of deformation and maximum value of the factor of safety.