At the Hickory Ridge Landfill near Atlanta, Georgia, a project is being undertaken to cap the landfill with solar geomembranes. It will be the largest solar facility in Georgia, and the largest solar landfill installation in the world. Covering an area of over 10 acres, the cap is comprised of 6,974 individual solar laminates, each generating about 144 watts of power. If my math is correct, that’s a little over 1 mega-watt or enough to power, enough to power about 240 homes. [Source: Waste360 via Geosynthetica.net News. Image: Waste360]
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ASTM Updates for March, 2012
This post contains a list of new, revised and otherwise updated ASTM standards that pertain to the geotechnical engineering, materials testing and related fields. Standard C39/C39M for testing the compressive strength of concrete cyllinders was updated, as was C42/42m for obtaining and testing drilled cores and sawed beams of concrete. The month of March also saw several geosynthetic standards being updated or added, including new standards for selecting the test method for geomembrane seams, and for testing the flexural rigidity of geogrids and other geosynthetics. There are also a few updated standards related to asphalt mix design and sampling of asphalt. Click through for updated ASTM Standards relating to geoprofessionals.
Geosynthetics at De-Icing Facitility
GeoSynthetica was kind enough to track down an interesting case study in the use of geosynthetics at a new de-icing facility at Cleveland’s Hopkins International Airport. Ethylene Glycol and Propylene Glycol are commonly used de-icing chemicals. Most de-icing is done at the gate to avoid flight delays, but it also increases the chance of environmental contamination. In the design of a new dedicated de-icing facility at the airport, geosynthetic clay liners (GCL), Geocells, geotextiles and geocomposites were all used to handle chemical-laden runoff as well as regular runoff during the non-icy times of year. Also there is a problem with high water table and a resulting detrimental effect on the pavement subgrade. This is where the aggregate-filled geocells were used. Read on for the link. (Photo by Spiritwood Images)