TUrbanization and climate change have increased extreme rainfall, aggravating urban flooding, groundwater depletion, and hydroplaning, which has led to wider adoption of low impact development (LID) measures such as permeable interlocking concrete pav...
TUrbanization and climate change have increased extreme rainfall, aggravating urban flooding, groundwater depletion, and hydroplaning, which has led to wider adoption of low impact development (LID) measures such as permeable interlocking concrete pavements (PICPs). However, PICPs are vulnerable to clogging by fines and debris, so their initial permeability performance is difficult to maintain, and conventional infiltration tests (ASTM C1701, KS F 4419) are too time- and labor-intensive for long-term monitoring of large pavement areas. This study aims to clarify the relationships among porosity, permeability performance, and bulk electrical resistivity of permeable blocks with different aggregate properties, and to examine the feasibility of using electrical resistivity for performance evaluation.
Permeable block specimens were fabricated using river gravel and highly porous volcanic rock as coarse aggregates, while varying the mix ratio of a two-component polyurethane binder to obtain different porosity levels. Permeability performance was defined as the infiltration rate (mm/s) measured by an ASTM C1701-based test, and bulk electrical resistivity was measured in the saturated state using a brass-mesh electrode cell and an LCR meter (1 kHz, ~20 °C). As binder content increased, porosity and permeability performance decreased, whereas bulk resistivity increased. Volcanic-rock blocks showed much higher porosity than gravel blocks, but their complex pore structure produced distinct differences in both permeability and resistivity responses. Porosity–permeability and porosity–resistivity plots showed clear trends but large scatter, indicating that porosity alone cannot fully describe the hydraulic and electrical responses. In contrast, an exponential negative correlation was obtained between permeability performance and bulk resistivity, which could be approximated by a single empirical equation that integrates both aggregate types and mix conditions. The correlation can be used to estimate permeability performance from measured resistivity or to define resistivity thresholds corresponding to target permeability levels. These results suggest that electrical resistivity can serve as a non-destructive indicator that reflects both internal pore structure and permeability performance of permeable blocks, providing a basis for developing field evaluation and long-term monitoring methods when combined with future clogging-stage experiments and in-situ validation.