Civil and Environmental Engineering Commons^™

Relating The Dongre Workability Test To Cold In-Place Recycled Asphalt Pavements, Gus Williams

Civil Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

The Dongre Workability Test (DWT) is a test for determining an asphalt pavement’s relative workability from the stress-strain curve of a sample. While the DWT has seen favorable results with warm mix and hot mix asphalt, Casillas and Braham (2020) attempted to apply this test to cold in-place recycled (CIR) asphalt pavements with limited results. This paper looked at the process of reexamining the DWT method to more favorable results with CIR samples. Phase 1 consisted of defining ten possible metrics from the stress-strain curve and applying them to samples with three different curing conditions. From these preliminary results, the …

Effect Of Various Speed Management Strategies On Bicycle Crashes For Urban Roads In Central Florida, Jorge Ugan

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

In recent years, cycling has become an increasingly popular transportation mode around the world. In contrast to other popular modes of transportation, cycling is more economic and energy efficient. While many studies have been conducted for the bicycle safety analysis, most of them were limited in terms of bicycle exposure data and on-street data. This study tries to improve the current safety performance functions for bicycle crashes at urban corridors by utilizing crowdsource data from STRAVA and on-street speed management strategies data. Speed management strategies are any roadway alterations that causes a change in motorists' driving behavior. In Florida, these …

Decision Tool For Prioritizing Bridge Repair Or Replacement, Nyoka Amy Florius

Civil Engineering Dissertations - Archive

Bridges are typically damaged/deteriorated due to various factors that require close evaluation to make informed decisions about repair/replacement. There are several aspects of study to evaluate bridges for repair/replacement, such as age, structural adequacy, and frequent usage. Further, bridges which are in poor condition must be identified to mitigate their damage/deterioration and as a result, maintain a safe environment for users. Therefore, to assess the need for funding, state Departments of Transportation are required to evaluate bridges by considering several factors, while prioritizing safety. In Texas, the Highway Bridge Program is responsible for funding bridges which are listed for repair/replacement. …

Improving Probabilistic Quantitative Precipitation Forecasting Using Machine Learning And Statistical Postprocessing Methods, Mohammadvaghef Ghazvinian

Civil Engineering Dissertations - Archive

The objective of this research is to address the limitations inherent in conventional statistical postprocessing schemes to generate probabilistic quantitative precipitation forecasts (PQPFs) and improve postprocessed PQPFs quality through introducing new robust statistical models and machine learning frameworks. This dissertation comprises three main elements. First, a new, two-part scheme for creating PQPFs from single-valued quantitative precipitation forecasts is introduced. This scheme, herein referred to as the Mixed-type Non-Homogenous Regression (MNHR), combines the use of logistic regression for estimating rainfall intermittency, and non-homogeneous regression for estimation of additional parameters of the conditional distribution. The performance of MNHR is evaluated relative to …

The Potential Of Location Data For Contact Tracing And Understanding Individual Mobility During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Marcus Figaro

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

In this study, we first review contact tracing methods used during the COVID-19 pandemic and provide an analysis of the benefits and drawbacks of different data collection and privacy protection methods. Our findings provide the benefits and drawbacks of using GPS versus Bluetooth for contact tracing, as well as the different data collection and storage methods and their effectiveness in protecting user privacy. We then analyze Twitter data to understand individual mobility behavior and sentiment by using a Natural Language Processing tool on text content of user tweets and Tweet coordinate data. Social media's ability to provide data on location …

Detecting And Evaluating Cracks On Aging Concrete Members With Deep Convolutional Neural Networks, Brendan Barnes

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Cracks in concrete structures are evaluated through a timely and subjective manual inspection. The location of cracks is often recorded in an inspection report where some cracks are measured. Although measurements or locations may not be necessary for all cracks observed in concrete members, if quantitative data can be gathered in an autonomous way, allowing measurement data to be used in tracking changes in spatial and temporal scales, this quantitative data can provide useful information not yet captured in the manual inspection process. This thesis aims to construct an image-based crack detection and evaluation pipeline that can assist health monitoring …

Progress And Prospect Of Anodic Oxidation For The Remediation Of Perfluoroalkyl And Polyfluoroalkyl Substances In Water And Wastewater Using Diamond Electrodes, Sean T. Mcbeath, Adrián Serrano Mora, Fatemeh Asadi Zeidabadi, Brooke K. Mayer, Patrick J. Mcnamara, Madjid Mohseni, Michael R. Hoffman, Nigel J. D. Graham

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

Although diamond electrodes are widely used in the field of electroanalysis and sensing, their application in the field of environmental engineering has yet to be fully realized. Many research studies have considered their potential application in water and wastewater treatment, where the in-situ electrochemical process can avoid the need for chemical additives by facilitating the oxidation of pollutants on the electrode surface or mediated by electrochemically synthesized oxidants in solution. Diamond-based electro-oxidation can effectively treat a number of organic micropollutants and is now being evaluated for the abatement of perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances, which pose health concerns and are ubiquitous …

Hybrid Structural Health Monitoring Using Data-Driven Modal Analysis And Model-Based Bayesian Inference., Jice Zeng

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Civil infrastructures that are valuable assets for the public and owners must be adequately and periodically maintained to guarantee safety, continuous service, and avoid economic losses. Vibration-based structural health monitoring (VBSHM) has been a significant tool to assess the structural performance of civil infrastructures over the last decades. Challenges in VBSHM exist in two aspects: operational modal analysis (OMA) and Finite element model updating (FEMU). The former aims to extract natural frequency, damping ratio, and mode shapes using vibrational data under normal operation; the latter focuses on minimizing the discrepancies between measurements and model prediction. The main impediments to real-world …

Data Driven Methods For Large Scale Network Level Traffic Modeling, Rezaur Rahman

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

Rapid growth in population along with urban-centric activities impose a massive demand on existing transportation systems, thus increasing traffic congestion and other mobility related challenges. To overcome such challenges, we need network-scale models to accurately predict real-time traffic demand and associated congestion. However, traditional network modeling approaches have shortcomings due to the complexity in traffic flow modeling, limited scope to incorporate real-time data available from emerging data sources and requiring excessive computation time to generate accurate estimation of traffic flows. Advancement in traffic sensing technologies with big data has created a new opportunity to overcome these challenges and implement deployable …

Drying Of Digested Biosolids For Weight Reduction Prior To Disposal, Juan Manuel Canales

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Disposal of belt filter pressed digested sludge (known as biosolids) to landfills cost El Paso Water about $1.1 million in the past year. With an increasing population, the amount of influent wastewater to El Paso treatment plants will also increase, resulting in increased biosolids generation and biosolids disposal costs. A method for reducing biosolids transportation cost is biosolids drying.The cost that El Paso Water pays for transporting biosolids to a dedicated landfill facility is based on the weight of the biosolids that are carried. Biosolids collected from the belt filter presses is about fifteen percent solids by weight, with water …

Structural Impacts Of Super Heavy Load (Shl) Vehicles On Transportation Infrastructure, Ali Morovatdar

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Operation of non-conventional Super Heavy Load (SHL) vehicles is an ongoing challenge for transportation stakeholders and the traveling public across the nation. Despite facilitating the movement of heavy, large, and non-divisible loads, passages of such vehicles with complex loading configurations that typically weigh several folds of the permissible weight limits set forth by regulatory agencies have been adversely affecting the structural integrity of pavement facilities. This translates into accelerated damage of pavement structures, which in turn poses safety concerns for users of the transportation facilities. Accurate quantification of such detrimental impacts is the precursor to preserve the existing transportation facilities. …

Building Energy Model Simulation Of A Single Building In Comparison To A Broader Building Stock, Paola Michelle Santillano

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Residential facilities and buildings are the largest consumers of energy in the United States. More than 76% of electricity and more than 40% of all energy consumption comes from providing a comfortable and healthy environment in buildings. Prioritizing building energy technology goals for performance and cost can significantly reduce energy use within the next ten years despite a substantial forecasted population increase. Retrofitting existing buildings and improving future construction has the potential to realize cost savings and environmental benefits over time. A key component to realizing these benefits is regional building energy modeling. One of the challenges to widespread building …

Spatiotemporal Variations Of Precipitation And Climate-Resilient Structure Design In Virginia, Xiaomin Yang

Civil & Environmental Engineering Theses & Dissertations

How to consider effects of climate change on the design and management of hydrology related infrastructure is crucial but remains a challenge for sustaining resilient society. To address this challenge, existing hydrologic design procedures may need to be revised and/or redeveloped to take into account the precipitation non-stationarity resulting from climate change. Using the state of Virginia as a testbed and advanced statistical techniques such as nonparametric test, spatial autocorrelation, linear regression, distribution fitting, and spatial interpolation, this dissertation developed an innovative framework to detect the historical spatiotemporal variations of various precipitation characteristics, namely maximum precipitation intensity, precipitation amount, simple …

Improving Pedestrian Safety With The Implementation Of The Demand-Responsive Transverse Rumble Strip As A New Traffic Safety Countermeasure, Md Shakhawat Hossen

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The traditional TRS has been extensively used as a traffic calming device to provide cognitive alerts in the form of sound and vibration to drivers. However, TRS always remains fixed on the road and thus exerts cognitive alerts, irrespective of any potential downstream hazards. Moreover, the continuous exposure to rumble strips has been identified as a source of discomfort and annoyance for drivers, which limits its application to potentially useful scenarios. This study explores a rumble strip design with dynamic behavior named as Demand-Responsive Transverse Rumble Strip (DRTRS) in order to address the limitations of static TRS. The study incorporates …

Quaternary Ammonium Compounds As Precursors To Disinfection Byproducts, Padmanabhan Krishnaswamy

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Disinfection of drinking water is crucial for providing a safe potable water supply. Some of the most common disinfectants employed are chlorine, chloramines and ozone. While these disinfectants successfully inactivate pathogenic microorganisms, they simultaneously react with inorganic or organic precursors to form toxic byproducts, most commonly referred to as disinfection byproducts (DBPs). While there is a wide variety of organic matter and disinfection byproducts known, in this study we have looked into the potential of certain quaternary ammonium compounds (QACs) to act as precursors to form DBPs, namely trihalomethanes (THMs), haloacetonitriles (HANs) and nitrosamines.

The ubiquitous nature of QACs in …

Developing Implementable Policies Targeting Sustainable Building Construction Through International Policy Diffusion, Melisa Ciara Hancock

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

The buildings and construction sector is one of the biggest sources of greenhouse gas emissions and contributes to vast list of negative impacts humans have on the environment through material production, natural resource usage, and waste. While many organizations like the United Nations (UN), OECD (Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development), and Architecture 2030 have been advocating for a shift to sustainability within the sector for decades, there is still a major disconnect between countries that have and haven’t implemented sustainability into all practices. This research focuses on analyzing the content of national building codes for their level of sustainability …

Identification Of Resilience Dimensions And Development Of A Decision-Making System To Measure The Resilience Level Of Highway Networks, Thahomina Jahan Nipa

Civil Engineering Dissertations - Archive

Local as well as national economy and safety depend on the network characteristics of the transportation infrastructures. Destruction of transportation infrastructures causes the direct cost of the reconstruction as well as indirect cost due to loss of mobility. In addition, emergency response and recovery cannot be rendered if access to the affected community is hampered due to a damaged transportation network. Hence, researchers as well national and international organizations are focusing more on a resilience-based approach instead of a traditional recovery-based approach for the transportation infrastructures recently. As a result, there exist a high number of research articles that developed …

Optimization Of Concrete Pavement Design To Truck Platoon Loading, Mohsen Talebsafa

Civil Engineering Dissertations - Archive

Transportation is the major contributor toward economic growth and development. In the United States, more than 90% of commodities are transported through the roadway system. Due to the high demand for transportation of goods, there is a high demand in the road freight industry for innovative solutions, and new technologies to improve the sustainability and efficiency of transportation. Truck platooning is one of the most recent technologies with great potential to make road freight safer, cleaner, and more efficient. This technology uses connectivity technologies and automated driving systems to interconnect two or more trucks in a convoy. These automation technologies …

Evaluation Of Surface Asphalt Mixes Containing Recycled Asphalt Materials In North-East Texas Using Accelerated Pavement Testing, Ana Maria Coca

Civil Engineering Dissertations - Archive

Reclaimed asphalt pavement (RAP) and Reclaimed Asphalt Shingles (RAS) has proved to be an effective alternative to virgin materials in HMA production. Despite that recycling asphalt creates a cycle that optimizes the use of natural resources and sustains the pavement industry, State transportation departments have limited the maximum amount of RAP used in surface layers because of the variability concerns and lack of guidance provided. Even though at the moment, the United Stated recycles more RAP than Europe does in terms of percentage of the total RAP extracted from old pavements, it still lags Japan and other countries. A special …

Reuse Of Recycled Plastic For Plastic Road Design, Tahsina Islam

Civil Engineering Dissertations - Archive

The ever-increasing volume of traffic and the volatility of daily and seasonal temperatures that are being experienced globally make it essential that the quality and durability of roads are improved. Modifiers can improve the engineering properties of the asphalt mix in these situations. Perhaps plastics are the most promising of all types of modifiers. Since the disposal of plastic waste is a major concern for the environment, recycling of these waste materials is highly desired. The recycling and reuse of plastic waste is a prime example of sustainable waste management. It reduces the buildup of waste in landfills, thereby reducing …

A Linear Dynamical Perspective On Epidemiology: Interplay Between Early Covid-19 Outbreak And Human Mobility, Shakib Mustavee

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

This research investigates the impact of human activity and mobility (HAM) in the spreading dynamics of an epidemic. Specifically, it explores the interconnections between HAM and its effect on the early spread of the COVID-19 virus. During the early stages of the pandemic, effective reproduction numbers exhibited a high correlation with human mobility patterns, leading to a hypothesis that the HAM system can be studied as a coupled system with disease spread dynamics. This study applies the generalized Koopman framework with control inputs to determine the nonlinear disease spread dynamics and the input-output characteristics as a locally linear controlled dynamical …

Building And Infrastructure Defect Detection And Visualization Using Drone And Deep Learning Technologies, Yuhan Jiang, Sisi Han, Yong Bai

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

This paper presents an accurate and stable method for object and defect detection and visualization on building and infrastructural facilities. This method uses drones and cameras to collect three- dimensional (3D) point clouds via photogrammetry, and uses orthographic or arbitrary views of the target objects to generate the feature images of points’ spectral, elevation, and normal features. U-Net is implemented in the pixelwise segmentation for object and defect detection using multiple feature images. This method was validated on four applications, including on-site path detection, pavement cracking detection, highway slope detection, and building facade window detection. The comparative experimental results confirmed …

Slicing-Based Artificial Intelligence Service Provisioning On The Network Edge: Balancing Ai Service Performance And Resource Consumption Of Data Management, Mushu Li, Jie Gao, Conghao Zhou, Xuemin Shen, Weihua Zhuang

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

Edge intelligence leverages computing resources on the network edge to provide artificial intelligence (AI) services close to network users. As it enables fast inference and distributed learning, edge intelligence is envisioned to be an important component of 6G networks. In this article, we investigate AI service provisioning for supporting edge intelligence. First, we present the features and requirements of AI services. Then we introduce AI service data management and customize network slicing for AI services. Specifically, we propose a novel resource-pooling method to regularize service data exchange within the network edge while allocating network resources for AI services. Using this …

Development And Promotion Of Mass Timber Noise Barrier For Highways, Harsh Bothra

All Theses

Highways are some of the biggest causes of noise pollution in the United States of America. To deal with the traffic noise coming from these highways, noise barriers have been erected across major highways. The goal is to reduce as much noise as possible through a sustainable solution. Unfortunately, the use of steel and concrete, commonly used materials, have undesired environmental impacts. A suggested sustainable alternative material would be mass timber. Mass timber products such as cross-laminated timber (CLT) and mass plywood panels (MPP) has attracted the attention of the construction industry in the U.S, as they are sustainable, light, …

Development Of Lambda Factors For Masonry Design With Lightweight Grout, Rumi Shrestha

All Theses

Reduction in structural mass, improvement in thermal performance, and reduction in shrinkage cracking through internal curing are some of the reasons that lightweight (LW) aggregates have been used in structures and pavements for decades. However, lightweight grout is still not permitted for use in reinforced masonry construction by the TMS 402/602-16 code. In order to realize the benefits of lightweight grout in U.S. reinforced masonry construction, a codified procedure for its use is required which must be informed by experimental testing.

This research is a pilot project directed to characterize the performance of LW grout in comparison to normal weight …

Deriving Generalized Temperature-Dependent Material Models For Masonry Through Fire Tests And Machine Learning, Aditya Avinash Daware

All Theses

Masonry is one of the oldest and commonly used building materials in the construction industry. Among a variety of benefits, masonry provides low-cost construction, fire, and weather protection as well as thermal and sound insulation. In addition, masonry has superior material properties at elevated temperatures which is reflected by its slow degradation of its mechanical and thermal properties. Literature shows that we do not have a uniform material model that describes the mechanical degradation of masonry under fire conditions. As such, this limits the use of masonry in fire-based performance design of masonry structures. To bridge this knowledge gap, this …

The Impact Of Increasing Flood Frequency On Flood Inundation: A Case Study Of The Little River In Florida, Maj Amanda Catharina Allen

Theses and Dissertations

Floods are considered one of the most devastating natural hazards and are projected to increase in frequency and magnitude in many places around the world, one of them being Florida. Understanding the potential changes of flood hazards due to climate change is of paramount importance for developing effective flood mitigation procedures and resilient infrastructures. In this work, changes in flood inundation characteristics (flood depth and extent) in response to changes in future flood magnitudes are estimated and analyzed for the Little River basin in northwest Florida. HEC-RAS hydraulic model is set up and validated against observations for the flood event …

Application Of Biochar As Beneficial Additive In Concrete, Temirlan Barissov

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Biochar is a high-carbon solid material produced via thermal decomposition of organic biomass in a low-oxygen environment. Characterized with high water retention properties and high alkalinity, biochar is generally used for soil amendment and fertilization purposes. This study is intended to explore the feasibility of using biochar as a beneficial additive of the most used manmade material, concrete. Literature review revealed several studies where biochar was successfully implemented as an additive in concrete. The beneficial influence of biochar on the mechanical characteristics of concrete is based on nucleation and densification effects. However, the internal microstructure, porosity and chemical composition of …

Modeling Watershed Sensitivity To Climate Change In Systems Affected By Discharge Of Mine Tailings, Johnette C. Shockley

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

For more than a century, a large volume of gold-mining tailings was deposited in Whitewood Creek and the Belle Fourche River, tributaries to the Cheyenne River in western South Dakota. Much of it still remains, and field and historical evidence indicates continued remobilization of tailings-containing alluvium in these bedrock-dominated channels. Both long-term, natural fluctuations in climate and anthropogenically driven changes can impact regional precipitation, temperature, hydrologic patterns, and ecosystem functions. Such changes have the potential to affect both the transport and distribution of arsenic-laden sediments and mechanical erosion that can undermine the stability of channel-bed and overbank material.

This study …

Seismic Performance Assessment Of Building Contents: Monetary Losses And Injuries, Sereen Majdalaweyh

All Dissertations

Building contents include all the components that are not attached to the building which the owners place after the construction phase, such as furniture, electrical equipment, glassware, and other personal items. Loss and damage assessment of building contents proved to be challenging in performance-based earthquake engineering frameworks because of the data sparsity. Damages to building contents during an earthquake not only cause monetary losses; tumbling and over-toppling of heavy building contents could result in injuries and even deaths of occupants. While major advancements have been made in performance-based earthquake engineering; however, the focus is mainly on damages and collapse risk …