Mechanical Properties and Eco-Efficiency of Steel Fiber Reinforced Alkali-Activated Slag Concrete

Materials

Sun-Woo Kim²  Seok-Joon Jang¹  Dae-Hyun Kang¹  Kyung-Lim Ahn¹  Hyun-Do Yun¹ 

[1] Department of Architectural Engineering, Chungnam National University, Daejeon 34134, Korea;Department of Construction Engineering Education, Chungnam National University, Daejeon 34134, Korea;

关键词: alkali-activated slag (AAS);    mechanical performance;    eco-efficiency;    ordinary Portland cement (OPC);    sustainable binder;   

DOI  :  10.3390/ma8115383

来源: mdpi

【 摘 要 】

Conventional concrete production that uses ordinary Portland cement (OPC) as a binder seems unsustainable due to its high energy consumption, natural resource exhaustion and huge carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions. To transform the conventional process of concrete production to a more sustainable process, the replacement of high energy-consumptive PC with new binders such as fly ash and alkali-activated slag (AAS) from available industrial by-products has been recognized as an alternative. This paper investigates the effect of curing conditions and steel fiber inclusion on the compressive and flexural performance of AAS concrete with a specified compressive strength of 40 MPa to evaluate the feasibility of AAS concrete as an alternative to normal concrete for CO₂ emission reduction in the concrete industry. Their performances are compared with reference concrete produced using OPC. The eco-efficiency of AAS use for concrete production was also evaluated by binder intensity and CO₂ intensity based on the test results and literature data. Test results show that it is possible to produce AAS concrete with compressive and flexural performances comparable to conventional concrete. Wet-curing and steel fiber inclusion improve the mechanical performance of AAS concrete. Also, the utilization of AAS as a sustainable binder can lead to significant CO₂ emissions reduction and resources and energy conservation in the concrete industry.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© 2015 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.