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Division of Industrial and Engineering Chemistry, 127th Meeting, ACS, Cincinnati, Ohio MARKETING CHEMICALS FOR SOIL STABILIZATION J. G. Affleck
2232
ClYlL ENGINEERING NEED FOR SOIL CHEMICALS T. William L a m b e ,
2234
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MIXING CHEMICALS WITH SOIL Julian C. Smith
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SOIL STABILIZERS FOR SEEPAGE CONTROL IN IRRIGATION CANALS AND RESERVOIRS C. W. Lauritzen.
2245
SOIL STABILIZATION BY INJECTION TECHNIQUES John P. Gnaedinger
2249
EFFECT O F FATTY QUATERNARY AMMONIUM SALTS ON PHYSICAL PROPERTIES OF CERTAIN SOILS Frank X. Grassi and John L. Woolsey
2253
ACRYLATE SALTS O F DIVALENT METALS Robert P. Hopkins.
2258
SOIL-WATER RELATIONSHIPS IN CALCIUM ACRYLATE STABILIZED SOIL Vincent C. Meunier, Gordon J. Williamson, and Robert P. Hopkins,
2265
ALUMINUM SULFATE AND IRON SULFATES AS AUXILIARIES IN BITUMINOUS STABILIZATION O F SOILS C. Kinney Hancock.
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2269
HEAT STABILITY OF TYPICAL ASPHALT ANTISTRIPPING COMPOUNDS Kenneth 1. Lisrant and Allen H. Farr.
2276
PANEL DISCUSSION.
2279
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2230
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T H E stabilization of soils with chemicals is an activity which was for all practical purposes, born of military necessity in the mid1940’s; it was nurtured by the armed services in comparative obscurity through the early fifties and brought dimly into the public view only in the past few years. Recent progress in this field, however, has aroused considerable interest and enthusiasm among chemical manufacturers and soil engineers alike. The occasion of this symposium, the first of its kind to be sponsored by CHEMICAL SOCIETY,is encouraging evidence of the the AMERICAN progress of chemical soil stabilization toward a position of justifiable importance in present-day chemical technology. The term “soil stabilization,” which is finding ever wider usage in both scientific and commercial circles, is in need of some clarification. Broadly speaking, it refers to any process that can alter an engineering property of a natural soil t o better suit the end use of the soil. Much of the work in chemical soil stabilization (particularly that under military sponsorship) has been aimed at converting soft, plastic soils--e.g., muds or unconsolidated sands-into satisfactory traffic-bearing materials, with the result that “stabilization” is commonly understood to refer to this restricted usage. However, processes or chemicals that can alter soil-properties such as fluid-permeability, water-wettability, compactibility, or deformability are equally important facets of soil stabilization; as a matter of fact, it appears at the moment as if chemical modification of these soil properties is closer to practical realization than the more limited objective of “solidification.” Failure to recognize the broad concept of soil stabilization has undoubtedly been one deterrent to rapid development in this area.
INDUSTRIAL AND ENGINEERING CHEMISTRY
Vol. 47, No. 1 1
SOIL STABILIZATION Until relatively recently, there was considerable skepticism regarding successful treatment of soils with chemicals of any type. The reasons for this skepticism were sound: Soils have long been recognized as notoriously variable in composition, structure, and properties; methods of analyzing soils were rough and inadequate; relationships between soil composition and physical properties were poorly understood and ill-defined; and the chemical reactions of major soil constituents that might best be exploited to permit chemical control of physical properties were quite nebulous. Over the past few years, basic research (predominantly at the university level) in clay mineralogy, surface and colloid chemistry, and soil physics has gone far toward unraveling these mysteries. This newly acquired (although still far from adequate) knowledge has provided a base for systematic search for chemicals for soil stabilization; research results t o date, coupled with a limited amount of field data, have gone far toward establishing the scientific soundness of chemical solutions to soil problems, and thus have given the subject an air of guarded optimism. Already many basic principles governing chemical modification of soil properties have been established, and laboratory evaluation of chemicals specifically selected in adherence to these principles is now proceeding at an increasing rate. The utility of a soil chemical is not proved at the lab bench, however; questions that must be answered with some assurance include: 1. In what types of soils is the compound effective? 2. Under what conditions-e.g., temperature, moisture content-should the soil be treated to ensure optimum results? 3. How easily and with what kind of processing equi ment can incorporation of the chemical into the soil be achieved.7p 4. What is the useful life of the chemical treatment?
Although carefully planned laboratory tests can throw some light on such questions, it is clear that rather extensive field testing will be an inevitable part of the product development picture. To the chemical manufacturer, the prospect of finding a market for a product as a soil-treating agent is highly attractive, if not a bit frightening. The quantities of earth handled yearly in the process of highway, airfield, and building construction alone verge on the astronomical, and the thought of the income that might be realized from the sale of such a product to even a small fraction of the construction trade (as well as of the burden of providing the commodity in adequate supply) is arresting to say the least. However, gaining a foothold in this area is far from simple for reasons not often recognized by the average chemical market development expert. Construction is a costly business whose success is measured by absence of failure: In few other fields are errors in judgment attested to by more enduring monuments. Asking a construction man or soils engineer to employ a new chemical as a soil-treating agent might be compared to requesting a chemical manufacturer to build a multimillion-pound-per-year plant to synthesize, by a totally unfamiliar process, a new product of questionable salability. In other words, there has been in the construction field no counterpart of the pilot plant or the trial batch, which has been the keystone of rapid progress in the chemical industry. Just how and by whom this missing link in the market development chain will be provided is a provocative problem, urgently in need of solution. Another obstacle to the exploitation of chemicals in soil treatment has been poor communication between chemical manufacturer and potential consumer. Chemistry and soil engineering follow widely differing disciplines, and it is only rarely that the capabilities and limitations of the one science have been duly appreciated by the other. Clearly, the chemist must familiarize himself with the soil engineer and his problems, and vice versa, before the two can aid and abet each other's efforts. This symposium, which brings together chemists, civil and chemical engineers, market development experts, government specialists, and industrial executives, who discuss widely diversified aspects of chemical soil stabilization and its potentialities, is perhaps one promising approach to the communications problem. Many of us will be anxiously watching the response t o these articles which,' if favorable, may mark a major turning point in the development and exploitation of this new and challenging field.
ALAN S. MICHAELS
Sandy clay, waterproofed with trichlorornethylsilane
Treated Soil
November 1955
Untreated Soil
INDUSTRIAL AND ENGINEERING CHEMISTRY
2231
