Northern Kuwait Soil Evaluation in Producing Environmentally Friendly Blocks

This paper presents the initial results of the evaluation of soil samples collected from the northern regions of Kuwait, in addition to the preliminary results of Compressed Earth Blocks (CEB) compressive strength tests for different mix designs. The performed tests and the produced blocks are part of a series of tests that evaluate the applicability of producing environmentally friendly construction blocks. The overall purpose of this study is to introduce a construction material that can be of environmental benefits to the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) region to reduce the construction industry impact on the CO₂ emission in the region. Soil samples were collected from Boubyan Island and Sabriya area, located in northern Kuwait. Basic engineering properties of the samples were obtained, including the soil gradation, the Atterberg limits, and the Optimum Moisture Content (OMC). Subsequently, 24 mix designs of CEB were tested to evaluate their compressive strength. The results showed that increasing the percentages of the clayey/silty soil in the block mixtures reduces the compressive strength of blocks with high cement percentages. Whereas compressive strength of blocks containing low cement percentages were increased with the increase of clayey/silty soil percentages to a certain extent. The study recommends that the soil/sand ratio is limited to 1.0.