Durability investigation of concrete culverts reinforced with steel and glass fiber reinforced polymer by acoustic emission

This dissertation presents a methodology to comparatively evaluate the durability of concrete culverts reinforced with traditional steel rebars and culverts reinforced with GFRP using the acoustic emission (AE) technology. GFRP seems promising as compared to steel rebars as they are not expected to corrode in harsh environments. However, in conventional structures use of GFRP as reinforcement is not usually desired due to the lower rigidity of the rods, which leads to excessive deflection. Structural analysis revealed that use of GFRP in buried concrete culverts is advantageous and can be explained by the fact that the behavior of buried structures is governed by the degree of soil-structure interaction in which the bending moment and shear forces are reduced in the walls of the structure with the reduction of their rigidity.; An experimental investigation is conducted to address the durability aspect of replacing steel reinforcement with GFRP in buried concrete culverts. A corrosive and aging environment was created for simulating real time problems. Specimens were prepared to be tested intact and after aging. Analysis of the experimental data was built both on the structural response of the specimens and on the AE activity. An AE methodology was developed to compare the structural behaviors of the specimens both before and after the aging process using a rate process theory obtained from literature.