Use of Waste Marble Powder and Supplementary Cementitious Materials for Enhancing Performance of Concrete

Abstract

Large amount of waste marble powder is being generated every year by various marble processing industries while cutting, grinding, polishing and shaping of marble stones. The main problem of this waste marble dust is if it is not made to use anywhere, it would lead to environmental pollution by land degradation and affect human life. In any concrete construction work, ordinary Portland cement is mainly used as a binding agent. Large quantity of cement which is used to make concrete, contributes in release of tons of Co2 gas and greenhouse gas emission annually to the earths atmosphere. On other hand, the large amount of availability of supplementary cementitious material like silica fume, metakaolin, GGBFS, etc. world wide create opportunity for sustainable utilization of these by-products as a substitute of OPC in manufacture of the concrete. The waste marble powder is like a mineral containing materials like lime, calcite, silicates, sulphate, magnesite, etc. and has very finer particles in powder with physical and chemical properties at par with cement. The main aim of the present study is to explore the possibility for use of marble dust as a binding material and to find an alternative solution for the partial replacement of cement in concrete. To achieve this aim various trial mixes are cast using cement, marble dust, silica fume, GGBFS and metakaolin, etc. for the M25 grade of concrete. Various tests are carried out for evaluating the mechanical properties and durability properties of prepared concrete mixes To develop the optimized mix, total 15 trial concrete mixes are cast using waste marble powder and supplementary cementations materials which are partially replaced in different mix proportions with cement. Based on the results of the parametric study conducted, five mixes are selected which are giving required strength and economy as compared to control concrete to develop M-25 grade concrete mix. Among five mixes one is control concrete, second is 15% cement replacement with waste marble powder and in third, fourth and fifth mix 15% replacement of cement with waste marble powder is kept constant and in addition to that 5% silica fume, 40% GGBFS and 12.5% metakaolin are replaced with cement respectively. Mechanical properties like compressive strength, split tensile strength, flexural strength and MoE of selected Finalized mixes are evaluated. Results of mechanical properties shows that third mix with 15% of cement with waste marble powder and 5% with silica fume gives best results as compared to other mixes while fourth mix with 40% GGBFS as cement replacement shows better results but not as good as third mix. To evaluate durability properties, various test such as water impermeability test, sulphate attack test, RCPT, accelerated corrosion test and carbonation test are performed. Results of durability tests show that fourth mix with 15% replacement of cement with waste marble powder and 40% with GGBFS gives best results among all mixes. So, from the results it can be concluded that mix with 40% GGBFS and 15% WMP with cement replacement is optimum mix.