Potential of Calcined and Uncalcined Termite Mounds as Pozzolans in Concrete Mix

Abstract

High cost of construction materials especially concrete and steel coupled with environmental unfriendliness of cement pose a great problem in building and construction industries. This makes a case for increased advocacy for affordable and environmentally friendly materials. One of the envisaged solutions to this impending problem is the use of termite’s mound as pozzolan. The potential of utilizing these two forms of termite’s mounds in concrete mix design has been exploited in this research work. The compressive strength as well the elemental composition of the various mixes was employed in conjunction with statistical packages to assess the potentials of utilizing termite mound for construction purposes. The compressive strengths were obtained with the aid of universal testing machine of 1000.0kN capacity, the elemental compositions were obtained using Atomic Absorption Spectrophotometer and models were also generated for predicting the compressive strength of either form of the termite’s mound using statistical package for social sciences. The results showed that the calcined form of termite’s mound has a compressive strength of 12.3 N/ mm2 and 12.6 N/mm2 for 5% and 10% percentage replacement respectively these values are comparable to the control mix compressive strength of 15.7 N/ mm2; This is an indication that calcined termites’ mound has a good potential of being used for concrete works in terms of compressive strength. The uncalcined form of termite’s mound has a compressive strength range of 6.9 N/mm2 to 6.0 N/mm2 for 5% and 10% respectively, this shows that its potential of being used for concrete work is very low and could therefore be recommended for making termite mound blocks. The greater compressive strength obtained in calcined termite mounds can be traced to the changes observed in the chemical composition of the calcined and uncalcined termites’ mounds.