Assessment of Corn-Cob Ash Stabilised Soil for Infrastructure Development in a Sprawled City

Abstract

This work elucidates the assessment of corn-cob ash stabilised soil for a sustainable infrastructural development in urban sprawled areas. Corn-cob (agricultural waste) was recycled into corn-cob ash (CCA) as a partial replacement with laterite soil at five different levels, 0%, 2.5%, 5%, 7.5% and 10% replacement by weight.  Geotechnical laboratory tests were performed on the soil material and a non-linear regression model that can predict the impact of corn-cob ash on the soil for infrastructure sustainability was developed. The laboratory result showed at 2.5 and 5.0 CBR that 2.5% and 5% CCA replacement yielded improved CBR values of 75.40 and 73.53 respectively before soaking and CBR values of 17.01 and 21.97 after soaking. The optimum value gotten at 5% CCA level. The model results predicted the results properly with coefficient of correlation of 0.79 and 0.91 for CBR results of 2.5 and 5 respectively. This study showed that recycling corn-cob waste as stabilizing agent for road infrastructural development helps in waste and environmental management which will result to a stable, friendly and sustainable built environment.