Assessing Sustainability Of Ground Improvement By Multi Criteria Based Quantitative Framework For Black Cotton Soil

Abstract

Civil Engineering is the major instrument of anthropocentric development over centuries through ever expanding infrastructure, cities and facilities. Civil engineering processes are both resource and fuel intensive. The building industry alone, during the construction stage, uses about 30-40% of the total resources used in the industrialized countries. There is a growing consensus that delivering a sustainable built environment starts with incorporating sustainability thoughts at the planning and design stages of a project. Geotechnical engineering is most resource intensive although this intensive consumption of energy goes unnoticed mainly because of the indirect nature of the energy used in the form of materials and natural resources (e.g. Granite Dust, Fly Ash and land use). Hence, geotechnical engineering warrants a sustainability study to balance the environmental effectiveness, technological feasibility and economic profitability in any civil engineering project. newlineIn this thesis, a quantitative, multi-criteria based sustainability indicator for ground improvement methods, is developed that will aid the design and decision making processes for ground improvement methods. Specifically two types of ground improvement methods, namely, BC soil mix Granite Dust and BC soil mix with Fly Ash, are considered. The impacts of these two types of methods create on the environment are investigated from the viewpoints of both resource consumption and process emissions. A life cycle analysis (LCA), which incorporates environmental impact assessment (EIA), is performed to develop sustainability metrics for ground improvement methods, considering resource use, process emissions and waste generation. Other environmental impacts like change in land use pattern, noise pollution, compaction and vibration have been qualitatively considered in the study. Resources utilized in the process are accounted for by the thermodynamics-based accounting methods of exergy and embodied energy. An economic cost-benefit analysis is per