Test Studies on the Corrosion Features for the Bridge Foundations Durability in a Household Refuse Landfill Environment

Abstract

Generally, the bridges or buildings cannot be constructed on a refuse landfill, since the special chemical compositions and microorganisms in landfill will impose adverse effects on the concrete foundations. Especially, the impacts on their durability are still unknown. The purpose of this paper is to get the corrosive features of a refuse landfill to give suggestions for the durability design of the structure’s foundation. The present work is based on a bridge construction in Linhai Road, Shanghai, which should pass through a household dump landfill in a rare environment, by means of a low-bridge crossing. With the aims of ensuring the durability in long-term service and providing some reference experiences, we have performed sampling tests on the bridge pile foundations under this corrosive environment, in terms of chlorine ion content, electric flux and strength. With regard to the positions along the radial direction of pile sections, the chloride ion concentrations varies slightly and negligibly with the varying coring depths and increases with the varying coring depths, indicating that the permeability in pile foundations is enhanced gradually with the increasing buried depths. Considering the calculated permeability coefficients, the concretes with the adopted compositions doesn’t meet the expected values. The measured electric flux of concretes under sewage condition is obviously higher than it is under standard curing condition, suggesting that the hazardous substances significantly affects the anti-permeability performance of concretes under on-site geological conditions. The damages of dump environment on the concrete durability of the bridge pile foundations were accessed.