Skip to main content
Log in

Utilization of coconut shell residual in green roof: hydraulic and thermal properties of expansive soil amended with biochar and fibre including theoretical model

  • Research Article - Hydrology
  • Published:
Acta Geophysica Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

The study intends to explore hydraulic and thermal properties of expansive soils treated with fibre, biochar and biochar–fibre mix. Both fibre and biochar are derived from coconut shell, which is highly common in coastal regions around the world. Besides, benefits, limitations and engineering feasibility of these geomaterials in green roofs are explored. Theoretical framework for thermal–hydraulic analysis is proposed based on mass conservation and the first law of thermodynamics. Heat capacity, thermal conductivity, water retention curve, crack intensity factor (CIF) and saturated and unsaturated hydraulic conductivities of four kinds of soils are evaluated and compared. Characterizations of geomaterials are also investigated via thermal mass loss, micro-structure, surface area and functional groups identification. Both biochar and fibre admixtures contribute to improvement in soil heat capacity and saturated and unsaturated hydraulic conductivities. Biochar enhances saturated and residual water contents of expansive soil by 10% and 8%, respectively. Also, biochar decreases soil thermal conductivity and CIF by 31% and 5%, respectively, while fibre decreases soil-saturated and residual water contents by 15% and 29%, respectively, and reduces soil thermal conductivity and CIF by 21% and 50%, respectively. Soil–biochar–fibre composite is also recommended due to low air-entry value, acceptable water-holding capacity and limited crack propagation. The study fills the knowledge gap of how soil thermal–hydraulic properties are affected due to biochar and/or fibre admixture. It is recommended to pay more attention on production and utilization of biochar derived from coconut shell currently utilized for fibre extraction.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5
Fig. 6
Fig. 7
Fig. 8
Fig. 9
Fig. 10
Fig. 11

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Abu-Hamdeh NH (2003) Thermal properties of soils as affected by density and water content. Biosyst Eng 86:97–102

    Google Scholar 

  • Aflaki A, Mirnezhad M, Ghaffarianhoseini A et al (2017) Urban heat island mitigation strategies: a state-of-the-art review on Kuala Lumpur, Singapore and Hong Kong. Cities 62:131–145

    Google Scholar 

  • Besir AB, Cuce E (2018) Green roofs and facades: a comprehensive review. Renew Sustain Energy Rev 82(1):915–939

    Google Scholar 

  • Bevilacqua P, Mazzeo D, Bruno R et al (2016) Experimental investigation of the thermal performances of an extensive green roof in the Mediterranean area. Energy Build 122:63–79

    Google Scholar 

  • Bogena HR, Huisman JA, Oberdorster C et al (2007) Evaluation of a low-cost soil water content sensor for wireless network applications. J Hydrol 344:32–42

    Google Scholar 

  • Bora MJ, Bordoloi S, Kumar H et al (2020) Influence of biochar from animal and plant origin on the compressive strength characteristics of degraded landfill surface soils. Int J Damage Mech. https://doi.org/10.1177/1056789520925524

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bordoloi S, Garg A, Sreedeep S et al (2018a) Investigation of cracking and water availability of soil–biochar composite synthesized from invasive weed water hyacinth. Bioresour Technol 263:665–677

    Google Scholar 

  • Bordoloi S, Kashyap V, Garg A et al (2018b) Measurement of mechanical characteristics of fiber from a novel invasive weed: a comprehensive comparison with fibers from agricultural crops. Measurement 113:62–70

    Google Scholar 

  • Bordoloi S, Gopal P, Boddu R et al (2019a) Soil-biochar-water interactions: role of biochar from Eichhornia crassipes in influencing crack propagation and suction in unsaturated soils. J Clean Prod 210:847–859

    Google Scholar 

  • Bordoloi S, Yamsani SK, Garg A et al (2019b) Critical assessment of infiltration measurements for soils with varying fine content using a mini disk infiltrometer. J Test Eval 47(2):868–888

    Google Scholar 

  • Brooks RH, Corey AT (1964) Hydraulic properties of porous media. Colorado State University, Fort Collins

    Google Scholar 

  • Chan FKS, Griffiths JA, Higgitt D et al (2018) “Sponge City” in China—a breakthrough of planning and flood risk management in the urban context. Land Use Policy 76:772–778

    Google Scholar 

  • Chen H, Koopal LK, Xiong J et al (2017) Mechanisms of soil humic acid adsorption onto montmorillonite and kaolinite. J Colloid Interfaces Sci 504:457–467

    Google Scholar 

  • Chun B, Guldmann J (2018) Impact of greening on the urban heat island: seasonal variations and mitigation strategies. Comput Environ Urban Syst 71:165–176

    Google Scholar 

  • Danso H, Martinson DB, Ali M et al (2015) Effect of fibre aspect ratio on mechanical properties of soil building blocks. Constr Build Mater 83:314–319

    Google Scholar 

  • De-la-Rosa JM, Knicker H, Lopez-Capel E et al (2008) Direct detection of black carbon in soils by Py-GC/MS, carbon-13 NMR spectroscopy and thermogravimetric techniques. Soil Sci Soc Am J 72:258–267

    Google Scholar 

  • Evett SR, Tolk JA, Howell TA (2006) Soil profile water content determination: sensor accuracy, axial response, calibration, temperature dependence, and precision. Vadose Zone J 5:894–907

    Google Scholar 

  • Garg A, Huang H, Kushvaha V et al (2020) Mechanism of biochar soil pore–gas–water interaction: gas properties of biochar-amended sandy soil at different degrees of compaction using KNN modeling. Acta Geophys 68:207–217

    Google Scholar 

  • Gustafsson SE (1991) Transient plane source techniques for thermal conductivity and thermal diffusivity measurements of solid materials. Rev Sci Instrum 62(3):797–804

    Google Scholar 

  • Hook WR, Ferre TPA, Livingston NJ (2004) The effects of salinity on the accuracy and uncertainty of water content measurement. Soil Sci Soc Am J 68:47–56

    Google Scholar 

  • Jeffery S, Meinders MBJ, Stoof CR et al (2015) Biochar application does not improve the soil hydrological function of a sandy soil. Geoderma 251:47–54

    Google Scholar 

  • Kaufhold S, Baille W, Schanz T et al (2015) About differences of swelling pressure—dry density relations of compacted bentonites. Appl Clay Sci 107:52–61

    Google Scholar 

  • Kumar H, Ganesan SP, Bordoloi S et al (2019) Erodibility assessment of compacted biochar amended soil for geo-environmental applications. Sci Total Environ 672:698–707

    Google Scholar 

  • Kumar H, Cai WL, Lai JL et al (2020) Influence of in-house produced biochars on cracks and retained water during drying-wetting cycles: comparison between conventional plant, animal, and nano-biochars. J Soil Sedim 20:1983–1996

    Google Scholar 

  • Laird DA, Fleming P, Davis DD et al (2010) Impact of biochar amendments on the quality of a typical Midwestern agricultural soil. Geoderma 158:443–449

    Google Scholar 

  • Li J, Wang SL, Zheng L et al (2019) Sorption of lead in soil amended with coconut fiber biochar: geochemical and spectroscopic investigations. Geoderma 350:52–60

    Google Scholar 

  • Liu XY, Yang G, Lipik V (2019) Permanent water repellent chemical modification of cotton fabric with reagents containing aromatic rings. Fiber Polym 20:51–56

    Google Scholar 

  • Lopez-Rodriguez G, Perez-Esteban J, Ruiz-Fernandez J et al (2016) Behavior and evolution of sustainable organic substrates in a vertical garden. Ecol Eng 93:129–134

    Google Scholar 

  • Lyon RE (2015) Thermal dynamics of bomb calorimeters. Rev Sci Instrum 86:125103

    Google Scholar 

  • Nektarios PA, Amountzias I, Kokkinou I et al (2011) Green roof substrate type and depth affect the growth of the native species Dianthus fruticosus under reduced irrigation regimens. HortScience 46(8):1208–1216

    Google Scholar 

  • Ng CWW, Leung AK (2012) Measurements of drying and wetting permeability functions using a new stress-controllable soil column. J Geotech Geoenviron 138(1):58–68

    Google Scholar 

  • Nguyen TT, Ngo HH, Guo W et al (2019) Implementation of a specific urban water management—Sponge City. Sci Total Environ 652:147–162

    Google Scholar 

  • Ni JJ, Bordoloi S, Garg A et al (2019) Simple model on water retention and permeability in soil mixed with lignocellulose fibres. KSCE J Civ Eng 23(1):138–146

    Google Scholar 

  • Ni JJ, Bordoloi S, Shao W et al (2020) Two-year evaluation of hydraulic properties of biochar-amended vegetated soil for application in landfill cover system. Sci Total Environ. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2019.136486

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Omondi MO, Xia X, Nahayo A et al (2016) Quantification of biochar effects on soil hydrological properties using meta-analysis of literature data. Geoderma 274:28–34

    Google Scholar 

  • Permpituck S, Namprakai P (2012) The energy consumption performance of roof lawn gardens in Thailand. Renew Energy 40:98–103

    Google Scholar 

  • Pituya P, Sriburi T, Wijitkosum S (2017) Properties of biochar prepared from acacia wood and coconut shell for soil amendment. Eng J Thailand 21:63–75

    Google Scholar 

  • Rahman MT, Zhu QH, Zhang ZB et al (2017) The roles of organic amendments and microbial community in the improvement of soil structure of a Vertisol. Appl Soil Ecol 111:84–93

    Google Scholar 

  • Rahman MA, Moser-Reischl A, Anderson M et al (2019) Comparing the infiltration potentials of soils beneath the canopies of two contrasting urban tree species. Urban For Urban Green 38:22–32

    Google Scholar 

  • Reig FB, Adelantado J, Moreno M (2002) FTIR quantitative analysis of calcium carbonate (calcite) and silica (quartz) mixtures using the constant ratio method. Application to geological samples. Talanta 58(4):811–821

    Google Scholar 

  • Sreedeep S, Singh DN (2005) A study to investigate the influence of soil properties on suction. J Test Eval 33:61–66

    Google Scholar 

  • Sreedeep S, Singh DN (2011) Critical review of the methodologies employed for soil suction measurement. Int J Geomech 11:99–104

    Google Scholar 

  • Sumi S, Unnikrishnan N, Mathew L (2018) Durability studies of surface-modified coir geotextiles. Geotext Geomembr 46:699–706

    Google Scholar 

  • Usowicz B, Lipiec J, Lukowski M et al (2016) The effect of biochar application on thermal properties and albedo of loess soil under grassland and fallow. Soil Till Res 164:45–51

    Google Scholar 

  • Villar MV, Lloret A (2008) Influence of dry density and water content on the swelling of a compacted bentonite. Appl Clay Sci 39:38–49

    Google Scholar 

  • Walsh CJ, Booth DB, Burns MJ et al (2016) Principles for urban stormwater management to protect stream ecosystems. Freshw Sci 35(1):398–411

    Google Scholar 

  • Wang L, Chen L, Tsang DCW (2019) The roles of biochar as green admixture for sediment-based construction products. Cem Concr Comp 104:103348

    Google Scholar 

  • Wang H, Garg A, Huang S et al (2020) Mechanism of compacted biochar-amended expansive clay subjected to drying-wetting cycles: simultaneous investigation of hydraulic and mechanical properties. Acta Geophys 68:737–749

    Google Scholar 

  • Windeatt JH, Ross AB, Williams PT et al (2014) Characteristics of biochars from crop residues: potential for carbon sequestration and soil amendment. J Environ Manag 146:189–197

    Google Scholar 

  • Xie CR, Ni PP, Xu MJ et al (2020) Combined measure of geometry optimization and vegetation for expansive soil slopes. Comput Geotech. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compgeo.2020.103588

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ye YX, Zou WL, Han Z et al (2019) Predicting the entire soil-water characteristic curve using measurements within low suction range. J Mt Sci 16:1198–1214

    Google Scholar 

  • Zhang QZ, Wang YD, Wu YF et al (2013) Effects of biochar amendment on soil thermal conductivity, reflectance, and temperature. Soil Sci Soc Am J 77(5):1478–1487

    Google Scholar 

  • Zhang L, Fukuda H, Liu Z (2019) Households’ willingness to pay for green roof for mitigating heat island effects in Beijing (China). Build Environ 150:13–20

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

All authors would like to express their gratitude sincerely to the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 51878185), the Changjiang Scholars Program of the Ministry of Education of China (Grant No. T2014273) and the Innovative Research Team Program of Guangxi Natural Science Foundation (Grant No. 2016GXNSFGA380008) for financial supports.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Guoxiong Mei.

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interest

All authors declare that there is no conflict of interest.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Wang, H., Garg, A., Zhang, X. et al. Utilization of coconut shell residual in green roof: hydraulic and thermal properties of expansive soil amended with biochar and fibre including theoretical model. Acta Geophys. 68, 1803–1819 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11600-020-00492-3

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11600-020-00492-3

Keywords

Navigation