Potential of treated contaminated soil as a sustainable stabilising admixture

Abstract

Soil improvement can be achieved by adopting different techniques suitable for specific application within the ambient environment and the incorporation of different materials into weak soils has proven to be one such technique. This paper deals with an attempt to study the potential use of treated petroleum contaminated soil as a sustainable stabilising material. In addition to improving the soil, a wider benefit would be the utilisation of treated soil which under normal circumstances would be disposed as a waste material or, may at best, be used as a landfill material at uninhabited sites. Laboratory experiments were conducted on the mixed soil samples where different proportions of treated soil were added to commonly available field soils of Brunei Darussalam. The stabilising effects on the field soil samples were determined in terms of change in density; results showed increased densities. The field soils’ grain sizes and their distribution were important factors in affecting the stabilising behaviour of the treated soil.