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The Engineering Behind Soil Stabilization with Additives: A State-of-the-Art Review

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Abstract

Soil stabilization using additives is considered as one of the sustainable alternative techniques to deal with acute material shortages. Critically reviewing the contemporary works on soil stabilization would help practitioners and researchers to comprehend the merits and demerits of each stabilization method, influential parameters, and associated constraints. Furthermore, the critical analysis might aid the authorities to develop standard protocols about the use of various additives for soil stabilization, which would persuade the industry personnel to adopt sustainable practices. This paper presents a methodical review of the present soil stabilization methods under five key areas namely, underlying chemistry, the influential factors, performance indicators, economic and environmental aspects, and industrial perspectives. Findings of the review indicate that cement-based stabilizers perform well irrespective of soil type and curing conditions, on the contrary, lime-based stabilizers require appropriate temperature and pH for strength development. The degree of stabilization depends mainly on soil type, compaction level, and curing type and condition. Most of the soils treated with different additives exhibited a reduction in plasticity index, and maximum dry density against stabilizer dosage irrespective of soil type. The typical values of unconfined compressive strength and California bearing ratio of inorganic and organic soils except for peat, treated with a 5% dosage of all common types of stabilizers, fall in between 700 and 1,500 kPa and 30–60%, respectively. Cement and cementitious blends exhibited better cost-to-strength, energy-to-strength, and CO2 emission-to-strength ratios for soils with low plasticity whereas lime-blended stabilizers seemed effective for high-plastic soils.

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Data Availability

The datasets used and/or analysed during the current study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Abbreviations

GW:

Well graded gravel

SC:

Clayey sand

SP:

Poorly graded sand

SM:

Silty sand

CL:

Inorganic clay of low plasticity

CH:

Inorganic clay of high plasticity

ML:

Inorganic silt of low plasticity

MH:

Inorganic silt of high plasticity

OL:

Organic silts and clay of low plasticity

OH:

Organic silts and clay of high plasticity

Pt:

Peat, muck, and other highly organic soils

OPC:

Ordinary Portland cement

RHA:

Rice husk ash

CKN:

Cement kiln

FLA C:

Fly ash—class C

FLA F:

Fly ash—class F

PHP:

Phosphogypsum

ESP:

Eggshell powder

LME:

Lime

BFSC:

Blast furnace slag cement

HL:

Hydrated lime

SL:

Slurry lime

QL:

Quick lime

MDD:

Maximum dry density

OMC:

Optimum moisture content

UCS:

Unconfined compressive strength

CBR:

California bearing ratio

MR:

Modulus of resilience

C:

CaO

S:

SiO2

A:

Al2O3

F:

Fe2O3

SEM:

Scanning electron microscope

XRD:

X-ray diffraction

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Contributions

Arulanantham Anburuvel: Conceptualization, Investigation, Formal analysis, Writing—original draft, Writing—review and editing.

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Correspondence to Arulanantham Anburuvel.

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The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

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Anburuvel, A. The Engineering Behind Soil Stabilization with Additives: A State-of-the-Art Review. Geotech Geol Eng 42, 1–42 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10706-023-02554-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10706-023-02554-x

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