Eco-eficacia de la estabilización mecánica de la tapia pisada a partir de mallas de refuerzo de botellas PET

Abstract

Earth construction is a vernacular technique that emerged as a housing alternative for different communities in the department of Santander, where the rammed earth wall was the technique that most settled and is preserved by local availability of the material and labor, however, its low study and little evolution in terms of resistance generate that the technique ends up being lagged behind and overshadowed by industrialized construction systems. For this reason, this research proposes to determine the eco-efficiency of the wall by implementing a reinforcement system of mesh made from recycled PET plastic with 5 and 10 cm openings. Characterizing its mechanical properties through laboratory tests according to INVIAS regulations, thus evaluating the compressive strength of the stabilized specimens and those elaborated in a traditional way, it was necessary the elaboration of 3 walls of stepped wall for each reinforcement used according to AIS 610-EP-17, where it was proved that the inclusion of bidirectional planar reinforcements not only potentiates the bearing capacity of the wall, it also provides ductility to the system, modifying in this way the failure modes. Now, in order to establish the sustainability of the stabilization process, the water return generated by the use of PET mesh was determined, where it was shown that the use of this type of reinforcement benefits the ecological and water footprint of the construction sector, emphasizing the saving of water resources where more than 90% of the volume required for the manufacturing process of the bottle returns to the production cycle.