www.anywaysolutions.com

AnyWAy Solid EnvironmEntAl SolutionSTerra firma

Terra firmAwritten by: John o’hanlon

research by: Will Kirby

AnyWay Solid Environmental Solutions solves the almost universal civil engineering problem of building on unstable terrain. Committed to the development goals of its clients, the Canadian company is much more than a technology innovator

AnyWAy Solid EnvironmEntAl SolutionS

aNSS shortened the time required to construct roads in addis ababa by approximately 60%

AnyWAy Solid EnvironmEntAl SolutionS

AnyWay is a small company in terms of headcount, but it’s remarkable how much ground, literally and figuratively, is covered by its 25 staff. From

its headquarters in Toronto, it controls offices and production facilities in Israel and South Africa, and has field staff operating in Ethiopia and Papua New Guinea, serving customers spread around the African and Asian continents. Intriguing so far. It might be a good quiz question to guess what these territories have in common! An intelligent answer might be mining, and indeed mining does come into the story. But it’s only one of the sectors served by AnyWay Solid Environmental Solutions, which provides soil stabilisation products to anybody grappling with problem terrain.

In the developing world where dependence on roads is constantly on the rise, the processes involved in constructing these roads are becoming increasingly significant. AnyWay was established in 1999 to provide a comprehensive and advanced soil stabilisation solution for road construction; a solution that placed great emphasis on being environmentally friendly. A unique patented technology registered worldwide, AnyWay’s Natural Soil Stabilizer (ANSS) has also been developed into an ancillary technology for creating low cost construction blocks based on local soils.

AnyWay’s business is primarily dealing with substandard soils, explains VP Matt Fisher. “Where people have problem soils that make it difficult for them to build a road, the traditional solution is often to

excavate the clay, dump it somewhere else, then find some better soil and truck it in as a replacement. Then you can build the road, but it is an expensive way to do it and has a large environmental impact. Our answer is to raise the engineering properties of substandard soils so they can be incorporated in the road bed.”

Clay soils all over the world tend to be flexible, swelling and shrinking seasonally as they absorb water then dry out. This causes cracking, potholes and distortion. A number of ways have been devised to counteract this, some of them giving a bad name to the concept of soil stabilisation, says Fisher: “There have been a series of enzyme or polymer based products, applied in solution to the soil. The trouble is these were originally conceived as dust palliatives, but when used to stabilise a road bed they have very mixed results.”

Those greatest of road builders, the Romans, used pozzolanic material (that turns into a cement over time) as a soil stabiliser in certain conditions so there’s nothing really new about the process adopted by AnyWay, which just refined this technology to meet a wider range of challenges. “We devised a traditionally based product that incorporates cement and lime and fibres with some other products to create tensile strength over a much wider response factor. We found that with low dosages we can get significant and durable increases in strength. In that sense we are providing traditional solutions to road projects.”

The method is to use a soil recycling aNSS is used in rehabilitating existing roads, as well as constructing new ones

“our AnSWEr iS to rAiSE thE EnginEEring propErtiES of SubStAndArd SoilS So

thEy cAn bE incorporAtEd in thE roAd bEd”

machine to lift and grind a substantial layer of soil, mix it with ANSS in powder form together with water and re-lay and roll it, all in a single pass leaving the surface ready to apply the final road surface. Not only is it a fast and efficient process, but it eliminates trucking material away to dump pits and replacing it with a more stable material (if any is available). That represents a massive saving to governments and private companies faced with the need to build infrastructure for social or commercial reasons.

One of the most challenging soils AnyWay has tackled is the ‘black cotton’ or vertisol found in many countries, including Ethiopia, where the company is active. It is sometimes called ‘the cancer of roads’. “When black cotton absorbs water it goes wild!” he says. “But we found we can stabilise that, reduce its ability to absorb water and its plasticity, so that we can then build a reliable layer on top.” Back in 2008 the company worked with an oil refinery at Harar in eastern Ethiopia to create a service road carrying

application follows simple, traditional techniques

AnyWAy Solid EnvironmEntAl SolutionS

“if WE cAn prESEnt A pAckAgE thAt includES trAining And loW coSt houSing,

thAt iS onE lESS hEAdAchE for thEm”

heavy trucks and service vehicles. The client needed to get back to work right after the road was completed, but deflection testing after the road had been in use for some time showed it was performing as expected: there was negligible deflection.

Now AnyWay’s stabilisation technology is the Addis Ababa City Roads Authority’s preferred solution for road projects in the capital and elsewhere in the country. For fast-growing Addis, with its new $200 million African Union headquarters building, this is much more than a simple engineering solution, says Fisher. “There are often benefits to involving as many people as possible in the process of constructing new roads in the capital. At the same time they have very problematic soils that are not responsive to traditional methods. So we incorporated our soil stabilisation of the road bed with the traditional cobblestone pavement they wanted to lay there.”

The city authority accordingly created jobs for 30,000 people on the local production and laying of cobbles. AnyWay is working closely with the city and its contractors to rapidly roll out sections of road. The resulting roads are spectacular and very functional for the city of Addis, says Fisher with understandable pride, since

this project is an excellent example of the combined development and social goals of the company.

AnyWay’s stabilisation technology is now going to be used in Ethiopia’s neighbour and Africa’s newest nation South Sudan, on a 700 kilometre road from the capital Juba to the Ethiopian border. The project will be constructed by a joint venture between the leading South Sudanese construction

company, ABMC Thai-South Sudan Construction Co. LTD, and Ethiopia’s Sunshine Construction PLC. AnyWay has already delivered specially adapted recycling equipment for the project. Again the challenge the project faces is dealing with black cotton soil and lack of good pavement materials. For these reasons, AnyWay’s technology is the preferred solution.

AnyWay has also designed a suite of products which uses its technology to facilitate the construction of homes and other buildings in a low cost and environmentally conscious fashion. AnyWay’s Soil Block,

25 kg bags facilitate the use of manual labour

Soil Mortar and Tile Bond are designed to incorporate local materials in the construction process to the greatest extent possible.

In September 2007, AnyWay received an Africa Business Excellence Award with respect to a

pilot programme in Simunye, Westonaria municipality, just 80 km away from Johannesburg at the Goldfields Centre in South Africa. The programme involved establishing a simple brickyard bringing in AnyWay’s products, a brick-making machine and training a number of the local community members to produce compressed stabilised earth blocks (CSEBs)

1999

Year AnyWay was established

AnyWAy Solid EnvironmEntAl SolutionS

“An upfront conSultAtion procESS iS nEcESSAry With thE community to

mAkE SurE thE SolutionS you providE ArE thE onES thEy nEEd”

and a section of road. The workers used the blocks to construct a home under professional guidance and instruction.

This side of the business is really complementary to the road stabilisation side, says Fisher. “Most contracts come with a CSR component, leaving the lead contractor with matters beyond their core competence. If we can present a package that includes training and low cost housing,

that is one less headache for them.” CSEB technology allows simple construction using local materials, providing local employment and enhancing community participation; a good current example is the school being built at the Kangundu suburb of Nairobi using blocks produced on-site. The project designed by AnyWay’s Kenyan distributor Concept Ltd includes classrooms, as well as a kitchen and dining hall for both primary

Cobblestone wearing course being applied

and secondary school students. In contrast to generic designs and

construction methods designed for the developing world, AnyWay has learnt that it’s important to recognise the individual character of every project. “A house in Angola looks different from a house in Sudan, so there’s no such thing as a packaged solution. An upfront consultation process is necessary with the community to make sure the solutions you provide are the ones they need. In the past people have tried to come up with generic packages to meet everybody’s needs but they never do!”

AnyWay has plenty of work on hand, though it would like to balance its portfolio with more private work for mining and

petrochemical companies. “We know we can save them money, but we can solve other problems, too. A few years ago a customer wanted to construct an oil drilling platform in the Cabinda province of DRC. They could not build a road to get the equipment they needed to a drilling platform in the interior. Every effort failed. We had to help them not only build the road but the drilling platform itself as well, using our technology, and as a result they were able to do the job. We are problem solvers and we work with our customers.”

accommodates all varieties of surfaces, including cobblestones, asphalt and chip seal

for more information about anyWay Solid environmental Solutions visit:www.anywaysolutions.com

AnyWAy Solid EnvironmEntAl SolutionS

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anyWay Solid EnvironmEntal SolutionS601-1 Yorkdale roadToronto, OntarioCanada, m6a 3a1

www.anywaysolutions.com