Laboratory Investigations of Liquefaction Mitigation of Ganga Sand Using Stable Carbon Material: A Case Study

Recently , biochar has been widely used in geotechnical and environmental engineering to solve various engineering problems. However, very few studies have been carried out to understand the cyclic behavior of the biochar treated soil. This study explores the possibility of using environment-friendly and stable carbon material (i.e., biochar) for enhancing the cyclic strength of Ganga sand. In this study, Ganga sand (located in Northern India) samples are dry mixed with 3%, 6%, and 10% biochar by weight and tested under low strain-controlled cyclic triaxial tests. The test results demonstrated a 30–50% increase in the number of loading cycles for biochar mixed sand than clean Ganga sand. Based on the cyclic test results, it may be inferred that biochar can be used as soil amendments to increase the liquefaction resistance of sandy soil. Future studies need to be conducted to understand the influence of the type of biochar (i.e., pyrolysis temperature and feedstock type, such as plant/animal waste) on the liquefaction potential of soils. However, such studies will promote commercial production of biochar as it is considered as an essential material owing to it carbon sequestration effects.