Feasibility study on silt reinforcement by electro-osmosis consolidation

The permeability coefficient of silt ranges from 6.0×10^-5 to 6.0×10^-4 cm/s, which is between that of soft clay and sand. Electro-osmosis consolidation has a good reinforcement effect on soft clay with small permeability coefficient and poor reinforcement effect on sand, but there is no clear conclusion whether it is effective for silt. Two experiments were conducted using electro-osmosis consolidation, and the current, water discharge and discharge rate, water content were analyzed. SEM was used to obtain the image of microstructure change of the silt, the microstructure parameters of the consolidated silt was measured by PCAS, and the relationship between microstructure parameters and corresponding macroscopic parameters were quantitatively analyzed to explore the feasibility of electro-osmosis consolidation for silt. The results showed that when the concentration of 1 mol/L CaCl₂ was injected from the anode, the water discharge and discharge rate of the soil were effectively increased, and the effective reinforcement time of electro-osmosis was prolonged. However, the bearing capacity and shear strength in both groups were not significantly increased, and the consolidation uniformity was poor. Therefore, electro-osmosis consolidation was slightly insufficient for the consolidation of silt. If the only objective is to shorten the silt consolidation time, it was considered to use electro-osmosis method in combination with vacuum preloading, surcharge preloading.