The consistency of current regulations for compacted clay liners

Abstract

The current requirements for a liner beneath any municipal, industrial or hazardous waste disposal site to be constructed in South Africa usually include at least one compacted clay layer. The required performance of these compacted clay layers is specified in terms of a maximum allowable hydraulic conductivity. This paper discusses two issues related to achieving this requirement; these are the acceptance criteria for quality control tests and the number of tests that must be carried out to ensure that a required standard of quality is achieved. The inherent variability of the hydraulic conductivity of a clay must be accounted for when interpreting acceptance criteria. This may best be addressed by invoking the concept of an equivalent hydraulic conductivity, the definition of which requires a statistical evaluation of the field hydraulic conductivity variability.

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