Improve Geotechnical Properties of Soils Using Industrial Wastes: A Review

The engineering problems of problematic soils are mainly related to their mechanical, physical, and mineralogical properties. Extensive efforts have been directed to mitigate damages that may happen for structures constructed on, or in these soils' types. Both conventional materials (e.g. cement, lime, etc.), chemical and produced materials were blended, mixed, or added to soils to improve their geotechnical properties. In the last years, different additives from the wastes of industrial processes have been adopted in engineering researches to improve soils. This paper reviews different industrial wastes materials (e.g., fly ash, blast slag, rice husk ash) as soil stabilizers, where the use of them has economic and engineering benefits. The effect of these materials on physical properties, compaction characteristics, compressive strength, and bearing ratio of soils have been presented, studied, and discussed. The contents of these materials are widely varied from reference to reference and reach a maximum value of 50%. These materials cause reduction in Atterberg limits and swelling potential to different degrees. For some soils, MDD and OMC increase with the addition of these materials, and verse versa. Almost, these materials cause an improvement in soils' strength and CBR. However, some wastes reveal more efficiently to improve the soil