Effect of chemical compounds in tidal water on asphalt pavement mixture

Roads along North coastal area of Java Island (Indonesia) often receive special attention due to their bad performance as a result of the presence of tidal inundation. Past researches indicated that the tidal water was a compound of chloride and sulfate with different concentrations from one location to another, and together they had an adverse effect on the road pavement. Unfortunately, the detailed information of the effect of each chemical compound on the pavement performance was still unexplainable. To examine the effect of each compound on the mixture, a simulation was conducted in this study by soaking samples of asphalt mixture continuously and intermittently (in wet-and-dry cycle) in solutions of chloride with different concentrations. For comparison, the results were evaluated against those of the mixtures immersed in fresh water and real tidal inundation collected from three different places along North coastal area of Java Island. The results showed that chloride may be the main contributor to damage the mixtures, however, a combination of chemical compounds and interaction of them had a more significant contribution to cause damage.