ALKALI-ACTIVATED CEMENT MORTARS CONTAINING RECYCLED CLAY-BASED CONSTRUCTION AND DEMOLITION WASTE

The use of clay-based waste as an aggregate for concrete production is an amply studied procedure. Nonetheless, research on the use of this recycled aggregate to prepare alkaline cement mortars and concretes has yet to be forthcoming. The present study aimed to determine: the behaviour of this waste as a pozzolan in OPC systems, the mechanical strength in OPC, alkali-activated slag (AAS) and fly ash (AAFA) mortars and the effect of partial replacement of the slag and ash themselves with ground fractions of the waste. The pozzolanic behaviour of clay-based waste was confirmed. Replacing up to 20 % of siliceous aggregate with waste aggregate in OPC mortars induced a decline in 7 day strength (around 23 wt. %). The behaviour of waste aggregate in AAMs mortars, in turn, was observed to depend on the nature of the ahiminosilicate and the replacement ratio used. When 20 % of siliceous aggregate was replaced by waste aggregate in AAS mortars, the 7 day strength values remained the same (40 MPa). In AAFA mortars, waste was found to effectively replace both the fly ash and the aggregate. The highest strength for AAFA mortars was observed when they were prepared with both a 50 % replacement ratio for the ash and a 20 % ratio for the aggregate.