Performance Behavior of Marginally Backfilled Reinforced Earth Wall

Over the years, granular soil has been the predominant backfill material for reinforced wall construction due to its high strength, good drainage characteristics, and constant engineering properties. However, due to lack of availability, transportation issues, and economic issues with this type of soil, the use of poorly graded marginal soil as backfill has increased. Marginals backfill are soils having fines and plasticity index greater than 15% and 6, respectively. The objective of this paper is to numerically compare the performance of reinforced earth wall with clean granular fill and marginal fill. For this purpose, 2D FEM was simulated in ABAQUS software. The numerical model's accuracy was first validated by comparing numerical results with experimental wall. The results of wall lateral deformation, reinforcement load, and toe reaction in the wall are validated. Further parametric study is carried out to study the effect of surcharge, reinforcement length, and spacing, wall height on wall lateral displacement. Based on the results of these simulations, several considerations for the design of reinforced earth wall are identified.