Molding water content of clay soils and hydraulic properties of mineral liners of waste landfills

Municipal landfills as engineering constructions highly dangerous to the natural environment have to be isolated by liners in order to prevent the anthropogenic pollutants transport, together with eg landfill leachates. Mineral liners, properly prepared and compacted, sealing the bottom, sides and the top of the landfills are one of the most popular manners of their isolation. The mineral liners are usually constructed of compacted clay soils to obtain, the required by the Polish Decree of the Minister of Environment of 3 April 2013 and the Council Directive 1999/31/EC of 26 April 1999 on the landfill of wastes, value of liner’s saturated hydraulic conductivity lower than 1 10 m s. The value of hydraulic conductivity of saturated soils is directly affected by the conditions of soil compaction, especially a molding water content. This paper presents an attempt of the determination of the effects of the molding water content of a selected clay soil on its saturated hydraulic conductivity and hydraulic properties of the sealing liner, constructed according to the actual standards, of the compacted clay material. Range of our studies covered the in situ and laboratory measurements as well as numerical modeling. Saturated hydraulic conductivity under natural conditions was measured by BAT probe, (GeoNordic) while the hydraulic conductivity of the compacted clay soils was tested by Humboldt Mfg. Co. permeameters for compacted soils, in accordance with ASTM D5856. The assessment of hydraulic properties of a bottom liner made of the clay material under study was performed by the method of numerical modeling of infiltration process with the assumed value of groundwater head with an application of the FEFLOW, DHI-WASY modeling software. The lack of validation in our modeling attempt influences the fact that our studies should be treated as preliminary.