Effective Water in Concrete with Recycled Aggregate

In the present work, recycled aggregate from construction and demolition waste including both coarse fractions and fines was used to produce structural concrete. A reduction of concrete strength and elastic modulus, in particular using fines and of the carbonation resistance of concrete under accelerated conditions, was observed with respect to using natural aggregate. The mechanism of water absorption of recycled aggregate in concrete was also studied. For the recycled aggregate, even including fines, similar levels of water absorbed to obtain the same strength as natural aggregate in concrete testing were observed. Lastly, it was shown that the water absorption of the recycled aggregate can be reduced by preliminarily carbonating the recycled aggregate. The Los Angeles coefficient was also increased by carbonation.