Canada Local First Nation business partners with engineering company on railway spring drain product

A Local First Nation Indigenous company in Canada has announced its licensing agreement with an engineering firm on the production, installation, sales, and training services of spring drains.

The Spring Drains, or S-Drains, are a type of composite geo-synthetic vertical drains, which are mechanically threaded between track ties.

86,486,883 acres of wetland are present in Ontario, Canada, which cause issues with the operation and maintenance of railway lines. Furthermore, the spring drains aim to reduce peat boils caused by train imposed dynamic loading.

Peat boils are formed, in this case, by train dynamic loading imposed on peat layers underneath it, which causes its liquefaction. The liquefied layers build up excess pore pressure, measured to be as high as 4 meters. The liquefied peat loses its strength and causes railway embankment material to fall through and cause a hole from which the excess pore water pressure finds relief and ejects peat.

Spring drains can be used in low permeable soils such as clay or peat to drain excess porewater, as well as to provide load transference in underlying competent soil layers.

Through the licensing agreement, a partnership of six Indigenous communities from the north shore of Lake Superior will actively be involved in commercializing spring drains.

The first implementation of the product was made in 2020 and showed a 90% decrease of excess head 2.5 months after treatment.