Treatment of clay soils with steel slag, in road engineering

Abstract

The road construction sector draws large quantities of materials every day to meet the needs of infrastructure networks. The main aim of the link between different regions is to facilitate the transport and connection of these agglomerations. With such a pace, a shortage of these materials is worsening by the day, causing an imbalance in our "ecosystem" on the way. All these factors and many others have raised the alarm among managers in the construction industry. Environmental organizations have since been constantly seeking palliative solutions to this global scourge. In addition, several industries generate a large amount of waste annually, in some cases recoverable while respecting certain technical and environmental criteria. It is in this environmental approach, embracing a philosophy of circular economy that multiple co-products (Slag, Fly Ash, Phosphogypsum, Silica Fume...etc.) have been tested and numerous studies have demonstrated their ability to be used as a substitute for natural resources. In this respect, the following article will focus, through studies conducted in public laboratory, on various mixtures of the "soil-slag" couple to assess their possible use in road engineering. First, an identification of the materials (soil from the Sidi Kacem region and slags from a steel industry) to be adopted in our analysis will be carried out, then we will proceed to Proctor/CBR tests on soil-slag mixtures, defined in advance in order to decide on the possibility of developing them in road engineering and thereby reduce the quantities in contribution of noble materials.