Sustainable utilization of waste slag aggregates as replacement of coarse aggregates in concrete

Abstract

The current study mainly aims on the usage of waste coarse slag aggregates (CSA) to prepare coarse slag aggregate concrete (CSAC). The waste slag aggregates are the by-products mainly obtained from the iron and steel industries. These wastes are mostly disposed off into the landfills and the newer alternative method of disposing are being researched. Also, the increasing rate of construction has resulted into the diminishing of natural raw materials. The present paper focuses on incorporating CSA as the replacement of 20 mm natural coarse aggregates to prepare CSAC for various volumetric replacement of 20%, 40%, 60%, 80% and 100%. Cube and beam samples having different percentages of CSA were casted to undergo the experimental analysis. The fresh, mechanical and durability parameters has been studied by performing workability, density, compressive strength, split tensile strength, ultrasonic pulse velocity, water absorption and water permeability tests, for the in-depth analysis. The outcomes from the experiments has shown decrease in the strength and durability properties for increasing count of CSA. Decrease in compressive and split tensile strength of 39.08% and 37.50% respectively was observed for 100% CSA replacement. In case of durability properties, the penetration depth has increased up to 69.84% for the 100% CA replacement sample. However, a very marginal decrease in the values were observed for the replacement content up to 40%. The study concluded that the utilization of slag aggregate is a sustainable approach by preserving the naturally available raw materials and also construction can be made economical.