Enhancing Sustainability of Building Foundations with Efficient Open-End Pile Optimization

Primož Jelušič ()
Additional contact information
Primož Jelušič: Faculty of Civil Engineering, Transportation Engineering and Architecture, University of Maribor, Smetanova 17, 2000 Maribor, Slovenia

Sustainability, 2024, vol. 16, issue 16, 1-15

Abstract: Optimizing open-end piles is crucial for sustainability as it minimizes material consumption and reduces environmental impact. By improving construction efficiency, less steel is needed, reducing the carbon footprint associated with production and transportation. Improved pile performance also results in more durable structures that require less frequent replacement and maintenance, which in turn saves resources and energy. This paper presents a parametric study on optimal designs for open-ended piles in sand, presenting a novel approach to directly compute optimal pile designs using CPT results. It addresses challenges posed by soil variability and layered conditions, with the optimization model accounting for interdependencies among pile length, diameter, wall thickness and soil properties, including the pile–soil plug system. A mixed-integer optimization model OPEN-Pile was developed, consisting of an objective function for pile mass and CO 2 emissions. The objective function was constrained by a set of design and geotechnical conditions that corresponded to current codes of practice and recommendations. The efficiency of the developed optimization model is illustrated by two case studies. In the case of Blessington sand, the calculation results show that it is more economical and environmentally friendly to increase the pile diameter and pile wall thickness than the pile length. In efficient design, the ratio between diameter and wall thickness is calculated at the upper limit. For the optimum design of piles in Blessington sand, the optimum ratios of pile length to diameter, diameter to wall thickness and length to wall thickness are 5, 50 and 250, respectively. In a layered soil profile, the decision of where to place the pile base depends on the resistance of the cone tip and the thickness of the individual layers. To determine in which layer the pile base should be placed, we need to perform an optimization for the given design data.

Keywords: open-ended pile; computational modeling; structural optimization (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/16/16/6880/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/16/16/6880/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:16:y:2024:i:16:p:6880-:d:1453851

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().