USE MARINE DREDGED SAND FOR PORT AREA CONSTRUCTION: A CASE STUDY OF SHAHID RAJEE PORT, IRAN

consequent accumulation at the shore results in both environmental and economic drawbacks. The annual worldwide estimations of dredging operations are between15 and 20 billion tons [1]. Dredged marine sands (DMS) are generally very soft soils with low shear strength, usually treated as waste [2]. The sustainable development,environmental issues and shortage of the construction materials lead to finding a beneficial solution for reusing dredged material. Currently, one of the largest dredging projects in northern coast of Persian Gulf is the developing project of Shahid Rajaee port. In total, 11.5 million cubic meter of natural coastal sediment were carried out by cuttersuction dredger, and disposed in foreshore area next to western part of the calmness basin. The geocell-reinforcement technique is one of suggested method in terms of its soil confinement and increases the strength and stiffness property of the soft soil [3]. In this paper application of geocell reinforcement has been examined. Also, the effect of cover soil layers over geocell was studied, using sand and gravel. In order to evaluate the possibility of constructing low volume roads with marine sediments, plate loading tests were conducted.