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While many riders use the new motorcycle parking lot outside Caldwell Laboratory, which was installed in August, few realize the significance of the lot: It is made of eco-friendly pervious concrete and is the first project of its kind at Ohio State.
Pervious concrete leaks water like a sieve, allowing water to return to the ground and eliminates the need for a drainage system. It is created by leaving most of the sand out of a concrete mixture and replacing some of the cement with fly ash, a coal by-product. The removal of most of the sand from the concrete mixture creates small holes that allow rainwater and snow to filter directly into the ground.
Tarunjit Butalia, a research scientist in civil and environmental engineering and coordinator of the Ohio Coal Combustion Product Center, said replacing cement with fly ash has environmental benefits.
“For every ton of cement in concrete that you replace with fly ash, you avoid 0.8 tons of CO2 emissions,” he said. “And with pervious concrete, you’re also recharging the groundwater instead of having standing water, which can be a health hazard.”
The design of a pervious concrete lot also helps reduce the amount of car-related pollutants released into nearby waterways, he said.
The lots are particularly appealing to areas at OSU where there is not enough available land to build drainage basins, said Sarah Blouch, OSU’s Director of Traffic, Parking and Transportation.
“The thing that really got our attention is that these lots get rid of standing water, and that’s exciting,” she said. “In cold weather, water freezes, melts and refreezes. People could slip on the ice, even in places with good drainage. With these new lots, you effectively get rid of that problem, at least in theory.”
University officials collaborated with Butalia and William Wolfe, a professor of civil and environmental engineering, as well as representatives from the industry to make the experimental lot a reality. Senior engineer of renovation and construction for OSU’s Department of Facilities Design and Construction Bo Zhang said in an e-mail interview that Anderson Concrete Corporation donated the concrete, the Ohio Ready Mix Concrete Association provided the use of its construction equipment, and Decker Construction of Columbus discounted labor and materials.
OSU’s Facilities Operations and Development did the in-house design and supervised construction, and OSU Transportation and Parking contributed funding, he said.
“Overall, there was a $20,000 savings to the University to have this demo installation put in place,” Zhang said. “We will monitor it very closely for at least one full year. We would like to know it performs during the winter.”
Looking to the future, Blouch said the gravel parking lots in south campus would be an ideal place for upgrades to pervious concrete, because this would allow the university to meet Environmental Protection Agency standards without building extensive drainage systems. If the university decides to pursue the project, construction could begin as early as summer of 2009.
