Development of Concrete Mixture Design Process Using MCDM Approach for Sustainable Concrete Quality Management

Abstract

The development of a concrete mixture design process for high-quality concrete production with sustainable values is a complex process because of the multiple required properties at the green/hardened state of concrete and the interdependency of concrete mixture parameters. A new multicriteria decision making (MCDM) technique based on Technique of Order Preference Similarity to the Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) methodology is applied to a fuzzy setting for the selection of concrete mix factors and concrete mixture design methods with the aim towards sustainable concrete quality management. Three objective properties for sustainable quality concrete are adopted as criteria in the proposed MCDM model. The seven most dominant concrete mixture parameters with consideration to sustainable concrete quality issues, i.e., environmental (density, durability) and socioeconomic criteria (cost, optimum mixture ingredients ratios), are proposed as sub-criteria. Three mixture design techniques that have potentiality to include sustainable aspects in their design procedure, two advanced and one conventional concrete mixture design method, are taken as alternatives in the MCDM model. The proposed selection support framework may be utilized in updating concrete design methods for sustainability and in deciding the most dominant concrete mix factors that can provide sustainable quality management in concrete production as well as in concrete construction. The concrete mix factors found to be most influential to produce sustainable concrete quality include the water/cement ratio and density. The outcomes of the proposed MCDM model of fuzzy TOPSIS are consistent with the published literature and theory. The DOE method was found to be more suitable in sustainable concrete quality management considering its applicable objective quality properties and concrete mix factors.