Effect of cement on mechanical behavior of soil contaminated with monoethylene glycol (MEG)

Abstract

This paper presents a study on the mechanical properties of a contaminated clay soil and its treatment by cement. One group of unconfined compression (UC) tests was performed on samples of natural soil, and soil contaminated by monoethylene glycol (MEG) with 40% concentration at different degrees of contamination (3, 6, and 9%). Another group of UC tests was conducted on the samples that were prepared as mixtures of clean or MEG-contaminated soil with different cement contents (3, 6, and 9%) at different curing times. The results show that the strength and stiffness of the soil contaminated with MEG is reduced increasingly by the degree of contamination. In addition, by adding cement to the contaminated soil, the strength of the soil is increased as a function of degree of contamination, percent of cement, and curing time.