Studies on usage of natural fibers and eco sand for sustainable concreting.

What is it about?

Modern construction materials need to have high strength and durability due to the loads that it may experience during its life cycle, also rigorous norms set by standardising agencies make it mandatory. Concrete is a brittle material that is having less tensile strength but its used in many tensile members including beams which demands some amount of tensile strength to be incorporated into it. Also demand for concrete production is steadily raising and its becoming numero uno due to its versatility, yet it needs modification to suit the need and demand. Incorporating fibers into the concrete is being practiced in field and also studied in research by bountiful researchers, in this work a combination of a natural fiber (Sisal) and a manmade fiber (polypropylene) is used in various compositions to increase the tensile strength and to reduce brittleness of concrete. Studies were conducted to identify the variation of strength with and without fiber is done in terms of compressive, flexure and split tensile strength. Promising results were obtained by using the combination of fibers and around 150–200% strength increase is obtained in tensile strength and 50% increase in compressive strength. Multiple ratios such as 0.5:1.5,1:1,1.5:0.5 is added in concrete and fine aggregate is replaced with eco sand which is a silica based sand obtained from cement industry as waste material. It is found that the compressive strength of the concrete with sisal fiber increases with increasing fiber content and flexural strength is found to be higher at higher fiber mix. The whole combination of this composite is eco-friendly and uses waste materials to increase the strength and durability of concrete.

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Why is it important?

Construction industry uses many building materials and among them concrete is most prominent and widely used material across the globe due to its usability, strength and availability [1], [2], [3], [4]. It is also seen in several countries that concrete usage is steadily increasing and the material availability to produce concrete is under thrust. Also, due to increased population and raising industrial needs coupled with urging urbanisation on-going demand for aggregates is on peak all over the world [5], [6], [7], [8]. Thus, researchers and policy makers are trying for alternative aggregates too for replacing conventional aggregates to avoid environmental deterioration due to resource depletion. Industrial byproducts that are unusable in any way are also ending up as concrete admixtures in the recent days, some are already being used widely including flyash, slags etc [9], [10], [11], [12], [13], [14]. In line with different findings, the slag like materials, including steel slag, copper slag, and various other slag like materials, were found to have been added to improve the concrete's characteristics. In many cases, the materials that were used to replace the conventional ones are similar to the original materials, so this is setting the stage for sustainable development [5]. Silica rich materials are found to be increasing strength and durability of concrete in multiple ways and cement industry wastes proved to contain silica in large quantities due to the usage of lime in their production process [15], [16], [17], [18]. Ecosand which is a silica based waste material is available in large quantity in cement industries across India which are not yet used properly but very promising in terms of strength increase and stability enhancement [8], [9], [10], [19], [20], [21], [22].

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