THE INDO-NORWEGIAN PROJECT ON ALTERNATIVE MATERIALS IN CEMENT AND CONCRETE COAL BASED BOTTOM ASH PROPERTIES ACCORDING TO INDIAN

N SPECIFICATIONS
S. Harsh1, C. J. Engelsen2, A.K. Mullick3, H. Justnes2, V. V. Arora1, P. Fidjestl4 National Council for Cement and Building Materials, India 2 SINTEF Building and Infrastructure, Norway 3 Former Director General of National Council for Cement and Building Materials and Special Advisor to SINTEF, India 4 Elkem Silicon Materials, Norway INTRODUCTION The industry-oriented BILAT-INDIA project (Environmentally friendly strategy for Waste Management in India Utilizing Cement and Concrete Production Technology), is an Indo-Norwegian collaboration ongoing in the period 2009-20111. The main objective is to contribute to further increase the utilization level of mineral wastes in Indian cement and concrete industry in an environmentally and scientifically sound way in order to ensure sustainable energy and resource management. The project is supported by the Research Council of Norway, the Royal Norwegian Embassy New Delhi, Borregaard Industries Ltd., Elkem Silicon Materials, and Norcem AS. The project is coordinated by SINTEF Building and Infrastructure, Norway in close cooperation with the National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (NEERI), and the National Council for Cement and Building Materials (NCB). The project focuses on the blended cement and concrete technology as well as providing practical solutions and form basis for guidelines. Emphasis are given to the synergies achieved by using ternary binder systems in concrete mixes as well as the use of appropriate admixtures in order to integrate certain waste materials at higher levels than todays practice. The prioritized materials are coal combustion residues, slag and C&D waste. This paper focuses on the physical and chemical properties of pulverized bottom ash sampled from two Indian thermal power plants2 and their evaluation as supplementary cementitious materials. EXPERIMENTAL The bottom ash samples, BA1 and BA2, were ground to fineness of 331 and 282 m2/kg, respectively, and evaluated for their chemical, physical and mineralogical characteristics. Binary blends of 43 grade OPC and bottom ash were prepared by replacing equal amount of OPC with ground bottom ash. Ternary blends were prepared by including silica fume in the binary blends as replacement of OPC. Three series of cement blends were prepared using each of the two bottom ash samples. The microsilica contents used to replace OPC in the three series were 0, 5 and 10 % respectively. Each series comprised of four cement blends prepared at different integration level of bottom ash. The integration levels used were 0, 10, 15 and 20 % and 0, 10, 15 and 25 % for BA1 and BA2, respectively. The binders were tested for their normal consistency (NC), setting time, heat of hydration at 7 days, flow, air content and compressive strength as per the procedures specified in Indian Standard IS:4031-1988 (Methods of Physical Tests for Hydraulic Cement). Mortars were prepared using 1 part cement blend, 3 parts standard sand, 0.10 % (solid content) of lignosulphonate based plasticizer and calculated water content as per normal consistency. The normal consistency (NC) was determined only for the first blend (zero integration level) of a series. The water used for obtaining this value of NC was used for the first as well as the other binders of the series.
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RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS The lime reactivity of bottom ash samples BA1 and BA2 was 4.8 and 6.0 N/m2 at Blaines fineness of 331 and 282 m2/kg, respectively and their compressive strengths at 28 days were 89 and 83.7 % of control. The bottom ash samples after grinding met the reactivity requirements specified for fly ash. Low LOI values and high reactive silica contents contributed to their observed good pozzolanic reactivity. Test results indicated a marginal reduction in NC of binders at higher microsilica contents. Higher integration levels with bottom ash normally caused longer setting times of binary blends. The ternary blends generally had significantly shorter setting times compared to binary blends indicating acceleratory effect of microsilica on setting time. The heat of hydration at 7 days (given as kJ per kg total binder) decreased with increasing content of bottom ash and decreasing content of OPC but relative to the OPC content it showed significant contribution from bottom ash and microsilica. The flow of mortars decreased with increasing content of microsilica in the binder series and was in the range of 16-31 %. Compressive strength data indicated generally the following: i) Lowering of compressive strengths with increasing bottom ash content of cement blends. ii) Increase in the strength with increasing age (determined up to 90 days). iii) Higher compressive strength of ternary blends at all ages indicating beneficial effect of microsilica on the compressive strength (Fig-1 and 2).
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Fig-1: The compressive strength of mortars prepared using binary and ternary cement blends incorporating bottom ash BA1 at different integration levels In general, the decrease in strength obtained at increased integration levels of bottom ash is considered to be lower than expected. The one day strength obtained for BA1 and BA2 at the highest integration level was above 80 % of the control sample. This is comparable to what cement plants use as a benchmark for early strength in their fly ash cement production. At 20 % integration with bottom ash BA1, the replacement of OPC with 5 and 10 % microsilica in ternary blends, resulted in 18 and 27 % increase respectively in 28 day compressive strength over the 28 day strength of binary blend.

Compressive Strength at Zero Integration Level

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Fig-2: The compressive strength of mortars prepared using binary and ternary cement blends incorporating bottom ash BA2 at different integration levels The ternary blends having 5 and 10 % microsilica replacing equal amount of OPC, and different integration levels with bottom ash, generally yielded higher strengths compared to corresponding binary blends. Such synergy in ternary blends has been reported earlier3. At highest integration levels of 20 and 25% with BA1and BA2, respectively, the compressive strengths of ternary blends at ages of 7 days and above were higher than the compressive strengths of not only binary blends but also higher than the compressive strength of OPC. This showed the beneficial combination of bottom ash and microsilica and were in compliance with the heat of hydration data. REFERENCES 1. C J Engelsen, P K Labhasetwar, S C Sharma, K Nath P, K Reknes, A K Mullick, P Fidjestl, P Brevik, R Myrdal, H Justnes and V Thakur, Environmental friendly strategy for Waste Management in India Utilising Cement and Concrete Production Technology Indo Norwegian BILATERAL initiative, In proceedings of the 11th International Seminar on Cement and Building Materials, pp 310-315, November 17-20-2009, New Delhi India. R K Jha, V Gedam, C J Engelsen, P Labhasethwar and M N Malmedal, 'Systematic collection and charaterization of Indian Mineral Waste and development of database, BILAT INDIA WP1 interim report. A K Mullick, H Justnes, P Fidjestl and S Harsh, Ternary Cement blends for improved sustainability, Proceedings, 13th International Congress on the Chemistry of Cement, Madrid, Spain, 2011

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