Abstract
Cold regions, such as Alaska, Russia and Canada, get attention from many countries due to the tremendous amount of natural resources which are buried there. An accurate evaluation of the frozen ground is very important because the behavior of the active layer is greatly affected by the soil characteristics and water content in the active layer. It is necessary for developing a construction technology for pipelines in cold regions. This study has two objectives: 1) First one is to evaluate the characteristics of a newly-produced insulated aggregate and 2) the other one is to check the applicability of insulated aggregate. A series of laboratory experiments (specific gravity test, sieve analysis test, direct shear test, test for abrasion of coarse and aggregates by use of the Los Angeles machine) were performed to estimate the characteristics of the newly-produced insulated aggregate. In addition, the laboratory chamber tests were carried out to evaluate the applicability of frozen soil behavior using the newly-produced insulated aggregate. The chamber tests were conducted to check the laboratory model surrounded by soil mixing the insulated aggregate and ordinary soil in order to prevent the damage of structures such as pipelines due to the ground being frozen. For the laboratory chamber tests, the extreme cold engineering laboratory was built within the Yeon Cheon SOC Demonstration Research Center, of the Korea Institute of Construction Technology. The performance of the frozen ground which was installed with the insulated aggregate using vinyl was evaluated through monitoring the time-dependent distribution of temperature and earth-pressure.
