OWNER:
Kerr McGee Chemical Corporation
Mobile Facility. Theodore, Alabama

ENGINEER:
Thompson Engineering Testing, Inc.
3707 Cottage Hill Road
Mobile, Alabama 36606

Kerr McGee’s existing iron oxide sludge containment facility was filled to capacity and the company was faced with either constructing a new containment pond at a different location or increasing the capacity of their existing pond. The estimated cost of a new facility was $1.6 million, which was not considered to be economically feasible. The only remaining alternative was to raise the dikes around the existing pond; however, an outboard dike raise using conventional 1V on 3H side slopes resulted in slope stability concerns.

A design was developed for an inboard dike raise with steep side slopes in order to increase the dike height by 10 feet. This increased the storage capacity by 83 percent. The design incorporated 1V on 1.5H outboard slopes and 1V on 1H inboard slopes. This resulted in a portion of the dike raise having to be constructed over the soft iron oxide sludge. Slope stability was accomplished by utilizing geosynthetic reinforcement incorporated at specified locations in the fill. Construction of the inboard dike raise was completed in May 1985 and placed into operation. Total construction time was two months and the resulting cost savings over constructing a new facility was $1 million.