Digital Commons Network^™

Numerical Investigation Of Heat Generation And Accumulation Contributing To Elevated Temperature In Msw Landfills, Alborz Fathinezhad

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Landfills are complex geostructures which contains organic and inorganic municipal, and in some cases industrial, wastes and are expected to remain operational for long times. Due to the complex nature of physical, chemical, biological, and thermal reactions that carry on within the depths of a landfill, unexpected incidents such as elevated temperatures could become inevitable. While uncommon to happen, elevated temperatures cause health and environmental issues such as odors, rapid settlements, slope instabilities. In addition, elevated temperatures can negatively impact engineered components in composite bottom liners, cover systems, leachate collection, and gas extraction and recovery systems.

Air intrusion into municipal …

Toward A Safer Transportation System For Senior Road Users, Saba Doulabi

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Senior pedestrians and drivers (65 years and older) are among the most vulnerable road users. As the population of seniors rise, concerns regarding older adults' traffic safety are growing. The advantages of using autonomous vehicles, innovative vehicle technologies, and active transportation are becoming more widely recognized to improve seniors' mobility and safety. This behooves researchers to further investigate senior road users’ safety challenges and countermeasures. This study contributes to the literature by achieving two main goals. First, to explore contributing factors affecting the safety of older pedestrians and drivers in the current transportation system. Second, to examine seniors’ perceptions, preferences, …

Using 2d Hec-Ras Modeling With Vertical Feature Extraction To Inform Ecological Design In The Lower Atchafalaya River Basin, Louisiana, Colin Anderson

LSU Master's Theses

A 2D HEC-RAS model was created to demonstrate applications of hydraulic modeling for informing ecological design. This was done by comparing the hydrologic conditions of a baseline year (2010) to that of the environmental flow prescription from Kozak et al. (2016). The inundation results are relevant to hydraulic connectivity and cypress regeneration.

The hydraulic model was created by assimilating numerous data sources, refining the model with vertical feature (VF) extraction, and calibrating/validating the model. Several topo-bathymetric sources were combined to create the digital elevation model (DEM). Most importantly, this included bathymetry of the backswamp. Polylines of significant VFs in the …

Incorporating Geopolymer Binders To Fully Utilize Recycled Concrete Aggregates, Matthew Upshaw

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

This study aims to develop a geopolymer concrete binder that will yield desirable strength and durability characteristics when applied to recycled aggregate concrete. In order to achieve this, a geopolymer binder consisting of a metakaolin-silica fume aluminosilicate source material blend activated by potassium-based alkaline solutions is developed and used in place of ordinary Portland cement (OPC) with four different levels of recycled aggregate replacement ratios. The properties of these concretes were analyzed and compared with the properties of OPC concretes produced with the same replacement ratio levels. The results showed that the geopolymer recycled aggregate concrete (GRAC) achieved greater than …

Wetland Soil Development Along Salinity And Hydrogeomorphic Gradients In Active And Inactive Deltaic Basins Of Coastal Louisiana, Amanda Fontenot

LSU Master's Theses

Coastal wetlands provide an abundance of ecosystem services that benefit society, such as essential habitat for commercial species, storm protection, nutrient cycling, and carbon storage. Louisiana faces rapid rates of relative sea level rise (natural subsidence and eustatic sea levels) that threaten wetland survival, which are amplified by a reduction of riverine sediment input. An important determining factor of marsh survival is the formation of wetland platform elevation, known as vertical accretion, which is determined by several processes including sediment deposition & erosion, below ground biomass (BGB) productivity, decomposition of organic matter, shallow & deep subsidence, and soil compaction. Feldspar …

Machine Learning-Based Bridge Load Posting Prediction, Sai Naga Sasi Aditya Bandaru

LSU Master's Theses

1600 (12%) of Louisiana's 13,000 bridges that allow the passage of people, goods, and services are load posted, meaning they are deemed incapable of securely carrying all legal loads. A machine learning framework for estimating the number of load-posted bridges within a regional bridge portfolio would be extremely valuable in the future for allocating essential resources during long-term planning. A framework of this type is necessary since a significant proportion of the bridges are load posted. Furthermore, deterioration due to aging and future increases in legal loads can compound this situation. In this setting, there is a lack of data-driven …

Machine Learning-Based Bridge Load Posting Prediction, Sai Naga Sasi Aditya Bandaru

LSU Master's Theses

1600 (12%) of Louisiana's 13,000 bridges that allow the passage of people, goods, and services are load posted, meaning they are deemed incapable of securely carrying all legal loads. A machine learning framework for estimating the number of load-posted bridges within a regional bridge portfolio would be extremely valuable in the future for allocating essential resources during long-term planning. A framework of this type is necessary since a significant proportion of the bridges are load posted. Furthermore, deterioration due to aging and future increases in legal loads can compound this situation. In this setting, there is a lack of data-driven …

Progression Of Marsh Edge Erosion: Quantification And Conceptualization Of Shoreline Mechanisms In Terrebonne Bay, La, Amina Meselhe

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Numerical Modeling Of Bulk Sediment Deposition And Scour In The Lower Mississippie River Physical Model, Ronald Joseph Rodi

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Land loss restoration along the southeast Louisiana coast relies on the replenishment of sand from the sediment of the Mississippi River. To further the understanding of sediment transport and hydraulic characteristics of the lowermost segment of the river, the Louisiana Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority (CPRA) funded construction of the Lower Mississippi River Physical Model (LMRPM). This distorted-scale, movable bed model encompasses the lowermost 193-mile reach of the river, including from Donaldsonville, Louisiana to the Gulf of Mexico the Bonnet Carre Spillway and planned river sediment diversions.

Designed to replicate the prototypical river hydraulics and bulk bedload (sand) transport, scaled …

A New Generation Of Open-Graded Friction Course For Enhanced Durability And Functionality, Hossam Abohamer

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

This study aims at (1) enhancing Open Graded Friction Course (OGFC) mixes durability using additives and other by-products; (2) investigating the impacts of selected factors on OGFC pavements seepage characteristics; (3) developing a quantitative tool to model the deterioration in OGFC pavements functional performance; and (4) developing new guidelines of Air Void (AV) content for OGFC for optimum functionality and durability. For the durability objective, eight mixes were prepared with a PG 76-22 binder and two sources of aggregate (i.e., # 78 limestone and # 67 sandstone). Three Warm Mix Additives (WMA), one by-product (i.e., crumb rubber [CR]), and two …

Passive Air Samplers For Community Monitoring Of Air Toxics Following Hurricane Ida In Terrebonne Parish, Sarah Besson

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Investigation Of Groundwater Depletion And Leveel Underseepage With Unstructured-Grid Modeling Approach, Ye-Hong Chen

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Unstructured grid is a tessellation of geometric shapes in irregular patterns that provides flexibility in grid design for groundwater modeling. However, groundwater modeling is mostly developed with uniform grid tessellation and layer, which could simplify model structure or cause expensive computational costs in high-resolution simulations. Unstructured grid incorporates non-uniform horizontal and non-uniform vertical discretizations providing the capability to replicate complex hydrostratigraphy, capture geologic features that are crucial for groundwater flow simulation, and reduce computational costs while maintaining a high resolution for areas of interest. This study contains three parts to investigate unstructured-grid approach on constructing high-fidelity groundwater models, comparisons with …

The Case For Large-Scale Carbon Capture And Utilization In Louisiana, Gloria Mullins

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Influence Of Cavs On Driver’S Decisions In Various Roadway Scenarios, Nathalie Joy Taboga Dalton

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Development Of Cost-Effective High-Modulus Asphalt Concrete (Hmac) Mixtures Using Crumb Rubber And Local Construction Materials In Louisiana., Ibrahim A.I.E Elnaml

LSU Master's Theses

One of the emerging solutions to enhance the durability of asphalt pavements is the use of a French asphalt mix known as “High-Modulus Asphalt Concrete (HMAC).” This mix uses a hard asphalt binder, high binder content (about 6%), and low air voids content as compared to Superpave mixtures. The key objective of this study was to develop a cost-effective HMAC mixture using crumb rubber and local materials in Louisiana. To achieve this objective, four HMAC mixtures were prepared using two asphalt binders (PG 82-22 and PG 76-22 plus 10% crumb rubber) and two Reclaimed Asphalt Pavement (RAP) contents (20% and …

Use Of Halide Radicals In Water Treatment, Madhusudan Kamat

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

The increasing population and a reduction in freshwater resources has made the reuse of water imperative [1-3]. Advanced oxidation processes (AOPs) enable the safe reuse of wastewater through the removal of persistent pollutants. The highly reactive nature of reactive species, like hydroxyl radicals is limited by their reactivity with ubiquitous compounds like dissolved organic matter (DOM)[4, 5]. The use of halide radicals can help improve the efficiency of UV-based AOPs.

This thesis investigates the mechanism of halide radicals in three different systems: a) the use of iodine radicals in functionalized fullerenes b) the use of UV/chlorine as an advanced oxidation …

Examining Optimal Truck Platoon Configurations To Maximize Its Operational, Safety, And Environmental Performance, Md Adilur Rahim

LSU Master's Theses

Efficient movement of freight is a critical component of the US economy and especially important to the southcentral region where several large freight distribution hubs are located. However, several challenges affect freight movement efficiency, including high fuel and labor costs, vehicular emissions, and traffic safety problems. Truck platooning is a promising application of connected and automated vehicle (CAV) technology that has great potential in addressing current challenges in freight movement in the USA and elsewhere. Few prior studies have examined the potential environmental and traffic operational impacts of truck platooning on freeways. In particular, little is known regarding its impacts …