Geopolymer concrete, or green concrete, is part of a movement to create construction materials that have a reduced impact on the environment. It is made from a combination of an inorganic polymer and 25 to 100 percent industrial waste.
Today the word green is not just limited to colour, it represents the environment, which is surrounding us.
Green Concrete is a term given to a concrete that has had extra steps taken in the mix design and placement to insure a sustainable structure and a long life cycle with a low maintenance surface. e.g. Energy saving, CO2 emissions, waste water.
The goal of the Centre for Green Concrete is to reduce the environmental impact of concrete. To enable this, new technology is developed. The technology considers all phases of a concrete construction’s life cycle, i.e. structural design, specification, manufacturing and maintenance, and it includes all aspects of performance, i.e.
- Mechanical properties (strength, shrinkage, creep, static behaviour etc.)
- Fire resistance (spalling, heat transfer etc.)
- Workmanship (workability, strength development, curing etc.)
- Durability (corrosion protection, frost, new deterioration mechanisms etc.)
- Thermodynamic properties (input to the other properties)
Advantages
- Reduction of the concrete industry’s CO2-emmision by 30 %.
- Increased concrete industry’s use of waste products by 20%.
- NO environmental pollution and sustainable development.
- Green concrete requires less maintenance and repairs.
- Green concrete having better workability than conventional concrete.
- Good thermal resistant and fire resistant.
- Compressive strength behaviour of ceracrete with water cement ratio is similar to conventional concrete.
- Flexural strength of green concrete is almost equal to that of conventional concrete.
Use
The light weight spongy concrete, used for roof slab and precast units in partitions for heat and sound insulation, prepared by mixing aluminium in the cement concrete is called a light weight concrete.
- Saw dust concrete
- Cellular or aerated concrete
- Pre-stressed cement concrete