Unsaturated behaviour of polymer enhanced geosynthetic clay liners

Geosynthetic clay liners (GCL) are a critical hydraulic barrier component in environmental containment applications with polymer enhanced variants becoming more popular in recent years. However, the behaviour of these polymer enhanced products is fraught with uncertainties. This thesis examined the adequacy of current characterisation methods at describing their behaviour and proposed alternative tests that can supplement existing methods. The water retention behaviours of the materials were also established and discussed within the framework of their pore structures. A generalised model was developed to describe the aforementioned behaviour. Their behaviour under simulated field conditions were analysed and validated the established model.