Development of Advanced Polymer-Soil Composites as High-Performance Construction Materials

Abstract

Construction using earth materials is an old building practice that can be traced back to approximately 10,000 BC. Costs for this type of construction are low because local materials are utilized, and structures are built with the simplistic technology available. More developed countries have moved on from earth materials to those such as concrete due to the better mechanical properties that they possess. However, the production of concrete has a detrimental impact on the environment as its production requires large amounts of energy, raw materials, and releases significant amounts of carbon dioxide. Polymer materials have been identified as useful soil-stabilizing additives because of their ability to fill voids between sand particles. Although polymers have been studied for their use in soil stabilization, they have not been explored as a potential substitute for concrete in construction. This research aimed to produce a composite building material with compressive strength values on par with that of concrete. In Chapter 2, the attempted functionalization of polymers was described to highlight methods capable of modifying polymers (plastics) for use. However, these experiments were paused to investigate the effectiveness of the highlighted functional group. A polymer solution was synthesized to exploit a covalent bond that forms between the polymer and the solid components of soil/sand. The production and compressive strengths of the formed polymer composites were outlined in Chapter 3. The results revealed the effectiveness of increasing amounts of the polymer solution. Variables that influenced the curing rate of the polymer composites were also investigated. This proof of concept study showed that polymer composites can be made to possess high compressive strength values.