Changes occur with time in PVC-P properties due to plasticizer loss. A water immersion test in the laboratory was performed on 11 geomembranes during 8 to 10 years. Globally, the behaviour observed is relatively good since plasticizer losses are less than 10%, except for 2 materials. A law relating to plasticizer loss as a function of’ time is used to assess the lifetime. The lifetime recorded exceeds -and sometimes significantly -100 years for 9 out of the 11 materials studied, but is very short (26 years) for one of them. Designers are thus faced with the major problem of criteria selection. Correlations with the results Qbtained during an accelerated immersion test are not perfect, but the material whose properties proved to be very poor in thttiong term showed very poor properties during the accelerated test. _This therefore highlights the interest of such a test type.
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