R.K. Rowe Lecture

26 Jun 2023
08:55 - 09:40
IMPERIAL MAIN HALL

R.K. Rowe Lecture

Untangling the mysteries of geosynthetic clay liners behaviour in aggressive and challenging environments

Over the past four decades, geosynthetics have become one of the dominant construction materials in municipal solid waste containment facilities and, consequently, have gained widespread acceptance for use as contaminant barriers. As our knowledge of the issues related to their function has advanced, their use has also extended to applications where they are exposed to harsh or severe environmental conditions. However, their application under these conditions generally pushes their performance beyond recommended limits typical for other environmental and engineering applications. Thus, transferring technology from applications specific to landfills to applications where severe extreme conditions (very high/low temperatures, extreme range in leachate chemistries, etc.) prevail is complex. Also, the recent concerns raised by regulators regarding their effectiveness in containing emerging contaminants pose other new challenges that need to be addressed in the future, as current containment liner systems were not designed with the primary intent to consider emerging contaminants. The lecture will focus on geosynthetic clay liners (GCLs) in barrier systems. It will describe the latest findings concerning their performance under severe environmental conditions and compatibility with emerging contaminants and will explore their practical implications.