Japanese Geotechnical Society Special Publication The 15th Asian Regional Conference on

Soil Mechanics and Geotechnical Engineering

Treatment of Iraqi collapsible soil using encased stone columns

N. Al-Obaidyi), ii), I. Jeffersoniii) and G. Ghataoraiv)

i) Doctoral researcher, School of Civil Engineering, University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham, B15 2TT, UK, e-mail:
nka229@bham.ac.uk,
ii) Assistant Professor, Civil Engineering Department, College of Engineering, University of Thi-Qar, Iraq.
iii) Professor in Geotechnical Engineering, School of Civil Engineering, University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham, B15 2TT,
UK,e-mail: i.jefferson@bham.ac.uk.
iv) Senior Lecturer in Geotechnical Engineering, School of Civil Engineering, University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham, B15
2TT, UK, e-mail: g.s.ghataora@bham.ac.uk.

ABSTRACT

Stone columns are widely used globally due to theirversatility and relative wide applicability to treat different soil
and foundation situations but much of the research undertaken to date has focused on their use in soft soils. In
countries like Iraq the use of stone columns is still limited from a practical point of view, chiefly as many other soil
conditions are commonly encountered. These include collapsible soils: soils that are prone to relatively rapid volume
compressions (through collapse of metastable fabrics) that occur due to the action of load and/or increases in water
content. Recent work has opened up the possibility to use stone columns in these soils by the use of encasement,
thereby overcoming the impact of loss of lateral support when collapse occurs.Area of potential will be discussed;
why stone columns could be beneficial for use in Iraq and how employing them as an alternative to conventional
ground improvement techniques in number of Iraqi projects would be cost saving and has other benefits.Also, a
review of soil conditions in Iraq will be presented and focusing how to treat collapsible soil by encasing the
individual stone column by geofabrics illustrating the scope for developing a reliable design approach which suits
Iraqi soils. An evidence of their potential applicability in Iraqi soils will be presented. Moreover, the installation
technique, facts regarding failure, factors control the behaviour of encased stone columns, calculation of bearing
capacity and settlement and some previous related laboratory work will be reviewed as well as recommendations
regarding the proposal work in this field are produced with this paper.

Keywords:Collapsible soils, Iraqi Problematic soils, encased stone columns, Ground improvement

1 INTRODUCTION
Stone columns have been used in Iraq since the 3rd
or 2nd century BCwith archaeological evidence having
been found in the heritage city of Hatra
(Al-Jumailyperscomms, 1999).Holes were found filled
with uniform pieces of rocks covered with lime as a
connecting material. In addition, rock discs with a
diameter equal to that of stone column, were seen
arranged at different distances along stone column
body.
On other hand, raw materials for stone columns
such as gravel are readily available and at a low cost, as
many new gravel quarries opening to meet the new
demandof rapid reconstruction which Iraq is now
seeing(e.g in Kerbala province by (Al-Maimuri et al.
2013). Moreover,Cino stones are abundantly available
in the north of Iraqand can be used as a fill material of
the granular column as it has been demonstrated
by(Al-Obaidy 2000). As a result to all of the above,
stone columns have a considerable potential to use in
Iraqi sites and using them as alternative to conventional
expensivefoundation solutions such as raft foundations
or reinforced concrete piles could be economically
beneficial.
However, installation of stone columns in Iraqi soils
at the present time still limited. The reason for that is
the majority of ground conditions there are not
considered stable for such foundations. As stone
columns obtain their load capacity from the
confinement mobilized by the surrounding soil (Hughes
& Withers 1974). Also, the lateral captivity offered by
collapsible soils thatlose strength and suffer froma
sudden collapse on inundation; may not be sufficient.
Consequently, the formation of the stone column itself
may be not applicable.
Casing the individual stone column with suitable
geosynthetic is one of the ideal solutions for solving
this limitation (Ayadat & Hanna 2005). This
encasement by geofabrics makes stone columns stiffer

http://doi.org/10.3208/jgssp.IRQ-01 564
and stronger further to the function of drainage that
they preserved(Murugesan & Rajagopal 2007). With
this increase in investment that Iraq witnesses of civil
engineering projects, alternative foundation methods
are being explored and these include encased stone
columns. This paper provides a brief review of the
work had done in Iraq regarding stone columns. Also, it
would produce the context of the use of encased
granular columns as a suitable ground improvement
technique to treat collapsible soils. Highlighting the key
challenges and issues that require careful consideration
for this approach to work effectively.
2 PREVIOUS RESEARCHES ON STONE
COLUMNS IN IRAQ
In Iraqi literature, stone columns were first
discussed by (Al-Mosawe et al. 1985)through their
study on a series of model tests on soft soil. Later, in
the ends of nineteen’s, an intensive research with this
area including lab experiments and numerical analysis
have been done. The most was to treat soft soils.
Further, few field studies were carried out too but on
relatively stiff soils(e.g. see Al-Obaidy, 2000).
Although, the above mentioning wide research in
this topic, there was no attempt to use granular columns
to improve problematic soils that present a number of
engineering challenges until 2003. Once (Salih 2003)
illustrated how stone columns stabilized with asphalt
and lime are considered as a successful technique for
controlling the collapsibility of gypseous soils.But the
wetting process in this research included soaking the
soil surface only. So other sources of inundation such as
rising groundwater table level have not beenconsidered.
Moreover,the effect of soil mineralogy on the
bearing capacity and the corresponding settlement was
studied by (Mandhour 2007). She performed her
laboratory tests on samples collected from three parts of
the country (west, centre, and south) all of them from
the unstable shelf area. Her findings indicated to
apossible use of the granular columns improvement
technique, but the researcher produced her
recommendation for performing similar tests under
controlled inundation conditions as inclusion water to
the samples have not taken intoconsideration.
To sum up, much research have been done to treat
soft soils by this remedy. However, little research
focused on treatmentfor collapsible soil in which water
inclusion was not ideally represented.On other hand,
there are several local publications focused on encased
stone columns to improve soft soils. Recent example on
that by (Fattah &Majeed 2012) in which finite element
analysis had been employed to study a geogrid encased
stone columns that are assumed to be supported by a
soft clay layer.
565
3 SOIL CONDITIONS IN IRAQ
(Buringh 1960) outlined the main features of soil
conditions in Iraq according to the geomorphological
regions: the Mountains and foothill region, the
Mesopotamian plain, and the Deserts (see Fig.
1)showing avariety of soil type and groundwater table
level crosswise the country. There are five main
problematic soils could be recognized as following:
•Loess: thin loess deposits are found on parts of Iraq.
Example, the southern edge of Lower Jezira Plain,
which locates within Al-Ramadi Province on the left
bank of the Euphrates River,see Fig.2. (Yahia 1971). It
should be noted that all studies related to loess have
been performed from agricultural and geological points
of view. While there is a crucial need to study the loess
from civil engineering standpoint as the construction
projects extend across the country.
•Sand dunes:large areas of Iraq are very arid and are
affected by wind erosion and formation and movement
of sand dunes, particularly in the middle and south of
the country(Al-Taie 1984). Sand dunes affect many
infrastructures within Iraq, e.g. the delay in completion
of the Highway No.1 between Diwaniyah and Hilla (in
the south as shown in Fig.2). The presence of which
was a major obstacle for the construction (Sissakian et
al. 2011).
•Expansive soil:in spite of many published papers,
confirmed the exits of swelling soil in middle and north
of Iraq and some in the south. The most affected area
with expansive clay is concentrated on the west.
Example on damage include the residential area of
Akashat Mine (near Rutbah in the west where tens of
houses suffer from severe damage due to swelling clays
(Sissakian et al. 2011).
•Sabkha soil: the collapse potential of saline soils is
principally related to the dissolution of salts. Most of the
valleys of Tigris and Euphrates,about 72000 km2,
contained saline soils, determined mainly in the middle
and the south of Iraq (Boumans et al. 1977). Sabkhas are
unfavourable areas for construction of anystructure;
unless special treatments are used, which are often
costly. Owing to very shallow water table, which is
usually less than 1 m and high sulphate content. In the
extreme southern part of Iraq, all roads and other
infrastructures are suffering from the effect of the high
percentage of salt in the subsurface, which acts as
highly corrosive agent (Sissakian et al. 2011).
•Gypseous soils: gypsum presented in the soil
causes an apparent cementation when the soil is
dry.nevertheless, the inclusion of the water resulting
dissolution and often leading serious collapse (Razouki
et al., 1994). In Iraq, the percentage of gypsum
content varies from 10% to 70 %, with about a third of
the land covered with gypseous soil. In areas when the
annual rainfall exceeds 350mm, the gypsum content
typically ranges between 3-10 %. In arid regions (with
less than 250mm of rainfall annually) the gypsum
percentage typically exceeds 50% (Ismael 1994)).
The long-term soaking has a considerable effect on
the behaviour of such soils. The soaking could affect
the shear strength parameters in expressions of
cohesion and angle of internal friction over time as
illustrated by(Razouki et al. 2007).Also, (Salih 2013)
confirmed this fact as he noticed that under water
pressure and axial stress by the end of the test which
last 60 days, there are small increases in strain but with
no failure. However, over long time periods of 166 and
238 days a notable failure has occurred.
Many researchers investigated the effect of leaching
and gypsum content on the behaviour of gypseous soil
such as (Al-Mufty 1997), (Al-Busoda 1999), and(Namiq
& Nashat 2011). Further, many improvements
techniques have been employed to treat gypseous soils
such as using some additives (Fattah et al.
2013),increasing compaction ((Razouki et al. 2012).
However, using granular columns was restricted to the
few previous examples mentioned in section two.
Fig. 1. Map of physographic regions in Iraq (taken from
(Buringh 1960)).
566
Fig. 2. Map of Iraqi large cities (taken from google,
page:http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/iraq/maps-ad
min.htm, accessed on 28/11/2014).
4 ENCASED STONE COLUMNS
Early examples of encased stone columns were
introduced by (Van Impe & Silence 1986).Case
histories indicated a successful performance in the
presence of this technique in soft soils. Examples are
givenby (Alexiew et al. 2005) in Europe, and by (de
Mello et al. 2008) in South America.Moreover,(Raithel
et al. 2008) presentedwork from across Europewhere
encased stone column have been used successfully.
However, little field research on encased stone
column to treat problematic soils had been done to date.
Of the few examplesavailable(Araujo et al. 2009)
investigated the behaviour of geotextile and geogrid
encased columns in porous collapsible fine-grained soil
by means of field load tests. They concluded that
encasing the sand column increased load capacity and
water injection at the column top caused soil collapse,
influencing the behaviour of the columns overall. These
authors reported the need for satisfactory bearing
capacity of the soil at the column base.
(Ayadat 1990) was one of the first to introduce the
encasement to treat collapsible soil. The treated soil
was a mixture gap-graded, consisted of 78% concrete
sand, 10% Leighton buzzard sand (less than 90 µm),
and 12% speswhitekaolin clay). According to his study,
introduction the geofabric reinforcement to the sand
column has contributed of increasing the ultimate
bearing capacity of the sand column in proportion to the
stiffness of the geotextile used. Also, an obvious
decrease in settlement had been noticed. Later (Ayadat
et al. 2008) discussed the failure process of the stone
column inserted in collapsible soil after wetting. They
reported that the stone columns have failed to
strengthen a loose fill thatdisplays collapse behaviour
through the loss of the lateral confinement of the fill.
The bulk of the research to date has investigated the
behaviour of encased columns in clay or sandy
soils.Little research in which there is areferring to the
potential of using this technique in treating collapsible
soil with a percentage of 5%. However, the share of the
actual work done on collapsible soil was just 2.5%,
which is small indeed. The pie chart in Fig. 3
illustrates these statistical percentages.
Fig.3.Percentages of studies regarding the encased stone column
in different types of soils.
4.1Installation technique of encased stone columns
Two main methods of installation of the
geosynthetic encased granular columns are outlined by
(Tandel et al., 2012).
4.1.1Displacement Method
In this method, a closed-tip steel tube has been
pushed down into the soft soil and then the cylindrical
frame of geotextile and fills inserting inside the empty
hole. After that, the tip opens, and the tube is pulling
upwards under a vibration. The method is usually
recommended for very soft soils (e.g. cu< 15 kN/m²).
4.1.2Replacement Method
This method of installation has been adopted if there
is a potential influence from the vibration on the
adjacent buildings, or the soil has a rather high
resistance to penetration. An open steel pipe is installed
into the soil until reaching the hard layer, following by
removing the soil within the pipe via an auger boring,
the void being filled with stones or aggregates.
4.2 Failure in encapsulated stone columns
In general, bulging failure occurs in encased
columnswith the size of bulging smaller than
thatobserved in ordinary granular columns (Ghazavi
and Afshar, 2013). Given that bulging of stone columns
takes place only in the upper portion due to lack of
lateral pressure, providing geosynthetic in that portion
may also be equally beneficial (Ali et al., 2010). In the
case of stone columns in layered soils, it can be seen
that bulging of stone column was predominant in
weaker soil. Due to lesser lateral confinement offered
by that soil (Das and Pal, 2013).
567
It is worth noting that column encasement has
negligible effect for a column undergoing elastic
deformations and begins to be functional only after
column yieldingcccurs. Using stiff encasements to the
granular columns is recommended under moderate
loads because for high applied loads, where the
encasement reaches its tensile strength it does not
provide any further improvement. (Castro and Sagaseta,
2011).
4.3 Ultimate bearing capacity
Fig.4 shows the unit cell model for an encased stone
column installed in a collapsible soil soaked with water
from the bottom (in case of rising ground water level).
The ultimate vertical stress in this case can becomputed
from three components as the following:
Stone column
Collapsible soil
h1
h
W.T
h2
Geofabrics
Fig. 4.Unit cell model of encased stone column installed in
collapsible soil.
1.dry (Unsoaked)collapsible soil that stay stiff as no
water inclusion occurs and is governed by the following
equation according to (Greenwood 1970)assuming
plain strain loading:
σv1 = kp (k1 cu+σr01 ) (1)
whereσv1: vertical stress of the top layer of soil
kp: Rankine passive pressure coefficient of the column
k1:coefficient =4 (see (Hughes & Withers 1974))
cu:undrained shear strength of the soil
σr01:is the effective radial stress from surface to the
water level and it is determined as described in the
following equation:
γh1
σr01 =k0 �p+ � (2)
2
wherep:applied Load,γ:unit weight of soil,h1:height of
the top layer of soil, and k0:coefficient of earth pressure
at rest.
2.wet (soaked) collapsible soil where their undrained
shear strength drops significantly on wetting so that
𝑘𝑘1 = in equation(1) no longer can be taken as (4). This
requires the introduction of the factor k2, which in
proportion to collapse potential of the soil as the
collapsibility of soil increases, so this factor decreases.
So, the vertical stress corresponding to the depth of the
inundation will be governed by the following equation
σv2 =kp (k2 cu+σr02 ) (3)
whereσv2: vertical stress of the bottom layer of soil,
k2:coefficient =f(cp) where cp= collapse potential of the
soil,
γh2
σr02 =k0 �p+γh1 + � (4)
2
andσr02: is theeffective radial stress of the soaked layer
whereh2: height of the bottom layer of soil.
3.the encasement effect: according to(Castro & Sagaseta
2011), in the vertical direction, the unit cell is
compressed, and theencasement can only take tension
because it is a flexible membrane. So, the encasement
works only in the radial direction. As a result to
maintain equilibrium and compatibility conditions, the
radial encasement pressure can be calculated from the
following equation:
Ts t
σencasement = 2 (5)
rc
whereσencasement: the radial encasement pressure,Ts: tensile
stiffness,t:the radial displacement, andrc:radius of stone
column. By adding equation (5) to the term
corresponding to lateral stress of soil in equations. (1)
and (3) and by substituting k1=4and k2 as a function to
collapse potential, the general equation to calculate
bearing capacity for encapsulated stone column inserted
in collapsible soil can be written thus:
Ts t
σv1 =kp �(4cu+σr01 )+�k2(cp) cu+σr02 �+
rc 2
4.4 Settlement
The settlement of untreated collapsible soaked
soil(∆unt.) could be calculated as a result of two
components; the load (δload) and the water
injection(δlwater)as shown by the following equation
(see,Murthy 2007):
∆𝑢𝑢𝑢𝑢𝑢𝑢. = 𝛿𝛿𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙𝑙 + 𝛿𝛿𝑤𝑤𝑤𝑤𝑤𝑤𝑤𝑤𝑤𝑤 (7)
h performance in such soils to develop a reliable model
= (∆en +∆ec ) (8)
1+e0
whereh: depth of the submerged collapsible
soil,eo:initial void ration,∆en: change in void ratio as
result to load ∆p (corresponding to e-logp curve without
wetting),and∆ec: change in void ratio as result to wetting
(corresponding to e-logp curve in case of soaking).∆en
and ∆ecin equation (6) can be gained from the adjusted
water content curve for normally consolidated soil
presented by (Clemence & Finbarr 1981) as when the
soil has collapsed it will behave as a normally
consolidated (Maswoswe 1985).After the treatment by
encased stone column, the total settlement ∆totalwill
reduce as described in the following equation:
∆total= ∆unt. *S.R.R (9)
whereS.R.R.: Settlement Reduction Ratio according to
(Priebe 1995) is considered to calculate as follow:
S.R.R= 1⁄1+α(R-1) (10)
whereα: area replacement ratio, the ratio between the
stone column to that of the composite cell of the
column and surrounding soil. R: the ratio of the stiffness
of stone columns material (Ec) to the stiffness of the soil
(Ec).Here as the column is encapsulated, the geofabric
stiffness (Eencasement) should take into consideration and
add to the stiffness of the column fill material and as
such R yields from the equation below:
R= (Ec +Eencasement )⁄Es (11)
By Substituting equation (11) into equation (10) and
then, equations (8) and (10) into equation(9) the total
settlement of collapsible soil could be obtained from:
h
∆total= (∆en +∆ec )* 1⁄1+α((Ec +Eencasement )⁄Es )-1) (12)
1+e0
5 CONCLUSIONS
Nowadays, the use of stone columns in ground
improvement for Iraqi locations has not been
considered. However, recent work has demonstrated the
potential for the use of encased stone columns as a
means to treat potentially collapsible soils, many
examples of which are found across Iraq. Key
findings from this review are:
1-additional lateral confinement produced from the
� (6)
encasement as described in the equation (6), showing
the level of improved bearing capacity achievable.
2-Iraqi soils can be treated through encased stone
columns as soils have with similar collapsibility have
been showed to be treated
successfullythrough,increases the load capacity and
reductions in settlements.
6 RECOMMENDATIONS
Further investigations are required to study the
that simulates Iraqi soil conditions whilstaccounting for
the effects of water inclusion over a long time period,
including as a result to existence of soluble salts which
be time dependent.
7 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific
research of Iraq is gratefully acknowledged for the
sponsorship. The authors would like to express their
gratitude to Professor Dr. Fouad Al-Jumaily and Dr
Omar al-Farouk Salem al-Damluji, the President of
Iraqi Geotechnical Society for their continuous
encouraging and support in publishing this paper.
568
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