Studies On Ambient Cured Slag Based Alkali Activated Binder Composite

Abstract

newlineABSTRACT newlineOwing to the excessive volume of carbon dioxide gas released into the atmosphere during the manufacture of cement, the use of Portland cement in concrete construction is under critical review. Initiatives to expand the usage of slag, fly ash to partly or fully replace the use of Portland cement in concrete have been gaining support in recent years. Currently, much of these industrial by-product wastes are discarded in landfills, posing an environmental threat. newlineAlkali activated concrete is almost a new alternative to conventional Portland cement as a binder and also as concrete. Cement concrete is used from the past centuries to date in construction projects due to its advantageous high moulding properties, mechanical and durable properties. On the other hand, the disadvantage with cement is carbon dioxide emissions into the environment, the present world is more focused on reducing the environmental polluting hazards and hence the construction sector is also looking for alternatives to cement, such promising materials are slag, fly ash, silica fume, rice husk ash, etc. One of the other ingredients used in binder /concrete are natural river sand, use of same causing depletion of natural deposits, hence alternatives to sand are Used Foundry Sand, artificial sand, used garnet sand, crusher dust, etc. are under review in the research field. The other problem associated with conventional concrete is curing with water, wherein curing of concrete in water scarcity areas causes problems and an alternative to water curing is ambient or heat curing. In the current research work, ambient cured slag based concrete is proposed. newlineIn the first phase of the current research study, concrete is manufactured by fully replacing cement with slag and sand is partially replaced with Used Foundry Sand (UFS) at 20% by wt. (fixed). The slag concrete developed by activation with alkali solution is hereby referred to as Alkali Activated Slag Concrete (AASC). The performance of AASC primarily depends on the dosage alkali solutio