Lubomir Kopecky

Application of geomorphologic knowledge for erosion hazard mapping

An erosion hazard map was elaborated using geomorphologic and lithological information; this was the base to characterize the erodibility of the territory. The aim of the proposed methodology is to define the areas where more detailed studies are necessary (e.g., to estimate rates of soil erosion, mitigation measurements, land use) to prevent future problems. Field work and remote sensing data (study of historical aerial photographs and satellite images) were used to understand the geomorphologic evolution and the current processes taking place in an area; this information was used to group the units according to its lithology, dynamic and slope inclination. The map was processed using the geographical information system and categorized in zones of very high, high, moderate, low and null fluvial erosion hazards. The map covers the Metropolitan Area of San Salvador, which is experiencing serious problems of mass wasting processes, collapse and settlements of foundations. Most affected areas belong to the Tierra Blanca Joven tephras which are unsaturated and cover most of the surface; nowadays, the urban projects and infrastructure resting in this material are suffering from extensive damage. The geotechnical information on the tephras shows a decrease in strength and collapsible behavior when saturated. Due to this, the use of Quickdraw tensiometers (suction) and TMS3 (soil moisture content) is proposed for monitoring. The methodology of erosion hazard mapping correlates well with mass wasting reported in the studied area, and for this reason, it could be a good way to protect the natural resources and improve the land use.

DETERMINING THE ROLE OF INDIVIDUAL FLY ASH PARTICLES IN INFLUENCING THE VARIATION IN THE OVERALL PHYSICAL, MORPHOLOGICAL, AND CHEMICAL PROPERTIES OF FLY ASH

The properties of fly ashes vary because of the differences in the properties of their individual particles, and the determination of variation in these properties is of interest to the industries which use pulverized raw fly ash in applications, such as in cementitious materials and in the recovery of certain rare elements from raw fly ash. To investigate the differences in individual particles, four pulverized raw fly ashes from thermal power plants of the Czech Republic were used in this research. It was observed from FE-SEM that all four fly ashes consist of glassy hollow spherical, solid spherical, porous spherical, bright spherical, porous slaggy and compact slaggy particles. Box and whisker diagrams were plotted from the data of EDX individual particle analyses, which showed that the data of percentages for the Si, Al, and Fe elements is more scattered as compared to other elements. It was further observed from ternary phase diagrams and pseudo coloured images, that nature of fly ash particles changes from alumino silicate glassy to alumino silicate calcite metallic to pure ferro-metallic,where glassy particles showed high percentages and pure calcite particles were absent in fly ashes. Furthermore, a comparison between the XRF, the EDX total area analyses, showed that the EDX individual particle analysis gives more realistic and reliable data with median, mean, and the standard deviation for percentages of each element present in the fly ashes.

Mechanical behaviour and durability of high volume fly ash cementitious composites

The purpose of this research is to separate different morphological particles of ASTM class F fly ash, and study their effect on mechanical behaviour and durability of high volume cementitious mixtures. In this research wet separation of raw fly ash is carried out, which resulted in three layers of different morphological particles. The first layer of particles float, comprise of about 1-5% of fly ash, is identified as cenospheres or hollow spheres. The second layer of particles is measured to be 55-60% of raw fly ash and consisting of porous spherical and rounded particles rich in Si and Al. The third layer particles is measured to be about 35-40% of raw fly ash. High volume fly ash cementitious composites containing second or third layer particles are tested under compression and bending, highlighting a higher strength and ductility in comparison to cementitious ones containing raw fly ash particles. KEYWORDS. Cementitious matrix; Raw fly ash; Second layer particles; Third layer particles.