The primary objective of this study is to manage price market items in the construction of walls for affordable structures with load-bearing hollow masonry units using the ACI 211.1 blend design with a slump range of 25-50 mm that follows the specification limits of IQS 1077. It was difficult to reach a suitable cement weight to minimum content (economic and environmental goal), so many trail mixtures were cast. A portion (10-20%) of the coarse aggregates was replaced with concrete, tile, and clay-brick waste. Finally, two curing methods were used: immersion under water as normal curing, and water spraying as it is closer to the field conditions. The recommendation in IQS 1077 to increase the curing period from 14 to 28 days was taken into account. The results proved that the compressive strength of the blocks of cured immersion under water increased by 2.63%-0.63% and 5.12%-7.88% for 10% and 20% concrete waste aggregates, decreased by 0,3.84% and 4.22%,6.41% for 10% and 20% tile waste aggregates, and decrease by 5.71%-6.10% and 12.1%-11.4% for 10% and 20% brick waste aggregates, respectively at 14 and 28 days, and beams that were cured by spraying performed a little worse than those immersed under water.
In this research paper, two techniques were used to treat the drill cuttings resulting from the oil-based drilling fluid. The drill cuttings were taken from the southern Rumaila fields which prepared for testing and fixed with 100 gm per sample and contaminated with two types of crude oil, one from Rumaila oilfields with Sp.gr of 0.882 and the other from the eastern Baghdad oilfield with Sp.gr of 0.924 besides contamination levels of 10% and 15% w/w in mass. Samples were treated first with microwave with a power applied of 540 & 180 watts as well as a time of 50 minutes. It was found that the results reached below 1% w/w in mass, except for two samples they reached below 1.5% w/w in mass. Then, the sample of 1.41% w/w in mass,
... Show MoreThe availability of low- cost adsorbent namely Al-Khriet ( a substance found in the legs of Typha Domingensis) as an agricultural waste material, for the removal of lead and cadmium from aqueous solution was investigated. In the batch tests experimental parameters were studied, including adsorbent dosage between (0.2-1) g, initial metal ions concentration between (50-200) ppm (single and binary) and contact time (1/2-6) h. The removal percentage of each ion onto Al-Khriet reached equilibrium in about 4 hours. The highest adsorption capacity was for lead (96%) while for cadmium it was (90%) with 50 ppm ions concentration, 1 g dosage of adsorbent and pH 5.5. Adsorption capacity in the binary mixture were reduce at about 8% for lead a
... Show MoreThis study examined the adsorption behavior of anionic dye (orange G) from aqueous solution onto the raw and activated a mixture of illite, kaolinite and chlorite clays from area of Zorbatiya (east of Iraq).The chemical treatment involved alkali and acid activation. The alkali activation obtained by treated the raw clay (RC) with 5M NaOH (ACSO) and the acid activation founded by treated it with 0.25M HCl (ACH) and 0.25M (ACS). The thermal treatment carried out by calcination the produce activated clay at 750oC for acid activation and 105oC for alkali activation. Batch
... Show MoreThe unstable and uncertain nature of natural rubber prices makes them highly volatile and prone to outliers, which can have a significant impact on both modeling and forecasting. To tackle this issue, the author recommends a hybrid model that combines the autoregressive (AR) and Generalized Autoregressive Conditional Heteroscedasticity (GARCH) models. The model utilizes the Huber weighting function to ensure the forecast value of rubber prices remains sustainable even in the presence of outliers. The study aims to develop a sustainable model and forecast daily prices for a 12-day period by analyzing 2683 daily price data from Standard Malaysian Rubber Grade 20 (SMR 20) in Malaysia. The analysis incorporates two dispersion measurements (I
... Show MoreMany cities suffer from the large spread of slums, especially the cities of the Middle East. The purpose of the paper is to study the reality of informal housing in Al-Barrakia and the most important problems that it suffers from. The paper also seeks to study the presence or absence of a correlation between urban safety indicators and urban containment indicators as one of the methods of developing and planning cities. This can be achieved through sustainable urban management. The slums are a source of many urban problems that threaten the security and safety of the residents and represent a focus for the concentration of crimes and drugs. The paper seeks to answer the following question: How can urban safety be improved through urban cont
... Show MoreConcerns about the environment, the cost of energy, and safety mean that low-energy cold-mix asphalt materials are very interesting as a potential replacement for present-day hot mix asphalt. The main disadvantage of cold bituminous emulsion mixtures is their poor early life strength, meaning they require a long time to achieve mature strength. This research work aims to study the protentional utilization of waste and by-product materials as a filler in cold emulsion mixtures with mechanical properties comparable to those of traditional hot mix asphalt. Accordingly, cold mix asphalt was prepared to utilize paper sludge ash (PSA) and cement kiln dust (CKD) as a substitution for conventional mineral filler with percentages ranging fro
... Show MoreThe Combined Economic Emission Dispatch (CEED) problem is crucial for optimizing power system operation by minimizing costs and emissions while ensuring grid stability and meeting demand. This paper addresses the complex, nonlinear, and nonconvex nature of CEED, arising from factors like valve-point effects and transmission losses, which necessitates efficient metaheuristic algorithms. We introduce an Improved Zebra Optimization Algorithm (IMZOA), an enhanced bio-inspired technique integrating advanced adaptive foraging and dynamic defense mechanisms, along with a cubic function for CEED modeling, to improve search efficiency and convergence. IMZOA demonstrates significant numerical improvements, achieving up to a 0.80 % cost reduction for
... Show MoreHundreds of infrastructure investment projects are inserted into the Iraqi government budget annually. Many of these projects suffer from suspension, delay in completion, corruption, or other negative issues known in Iraqi construction projects. This may harm the country's economic recovery due to allocating funds to useless projects from one or more feasibility studies' components. Therefore, the best solution is to pay attention to the feasibility study reports. This study highlights the importance of feasibility studies reports for investment projects and their effective role in evaluating project ideas to ensure an equitable distribution of a country's financial resources to the most feasible investment projects. This importance
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