Mechanical and durability behavior of recycled aggregate concrete made with different kinds of wastewater

Abstract

The reuse of industrial wastewater and the recycling of construction and demolition waste material produced by the construction industry will lead to a sustainable environment by reducing the exploitation of the new natural resources and the waste deposit areas. The present study endeavors to investigate the mechanical and durability performance of recycled aggregate concrete (RAC) made with five different kinds of wastewater taken from domestic sewerage, fertilizer factory, textile factory, sugar factory, and service station. The potable water was completely replaced with each kind of wastewater for the mixing of concrete to examine its effect on compressive strength (CS) and split tensile strength (STS), water absorption (WA), chloride penetration (CP), and resistance against sulfuric acid attack of RAC at various testing days. The results show that using the wastewater taken from the textile factory in the production of RAC presents the maximum CS (32.2 MPa) and STS (3 MPa) that were 19% and 16% higher than that of the RAC made with potable water. The use of wastewater taken from domestic sewerage for the mixing of RAC presented the highest WA (13.88%). The usage of wastewater taken from the fertilizer factory in the production of RAC depicted the maximum mass loss (19.62% at 120 days of testing) due to an attack of 4% H2SO4 and the highest CP (16.49 mm at 28 days of testing). The statistical analysis depicted a considerable difference among the CS and CP of RAC mixes while no considerable difference was depicted by the statistical tests for the WA, STS, and acid attack for various RAC mixes.