PERFORMANCE OF SINGLE PILE IN OIL CONTAMINATED SAND UNDER AXIAL LOADING

Every day, petrochemical activities, oil spills, and pipeline or reservoir leakage contaminate the ground. In addition to environmental concerns, such as groundwater pollution, the alteration of geotechnical properties of the contaminated soil is also cause for worry. Contamination has been proven to alter the geotechnical properties of soil, and researchers have extensively studied the properties of contaminated granular soils. However, the effect of oil contamination on the geotechnical properties of fine-grained soils has not yet been well evaluated. Therefore, a comprehensive set of laboratory pile load tests has been conducted in contaminated sand. The model parameter are varied, namely thickness of contaminated layer and percentage of oil contamination. The tests were performed with an oil content of 2.0, 2.5, and 3.0 % with respect to dry soil to match the field condition. This is an extensive program of work, done on single pile in oil content of 0, 0.5, 1.0, and 1.5 which were published earlier. From the results, it is observed that the maximum pile capacity in all percentages of oil contamination was found in the range of L_c/L_p = 0.50 to 1.0.