AbstractHistorically known for being one of the major pollutants in the world, the construction industry, always in constant advancement and development, is currently evolving towards more environmentally friendly technologies and methods. Scientists and engineers seek to develop and implement green alternatives to conventional construction materials. One of these alternatives is to introduce an abundant, hard to recycle, material that could serve as a partial aggregate replacement in masonry bricks or even in a more conventional concrete mixture. The present work studied the use of 3 different types of repurposed plastics with different constitutions and particle size distribution. Accordingly, several brick and concrete mix designs were developed to determine the practicality of using these plastics as partial aggregate replacements. After establishing proper working material ratios for each brick and concrete mix, compression tests as well as tensile tests for the concrete mixes helped determine the structural capacity of both applications. Presented results proved that structural strength can indeed be reached in a masonry unit, using up to a 43% in volume of plastic. Furthermore, a workable structural strength for concrete can be achieved at fourteen days of curing, using up to a 50% aggregate replacement. A straightforward cost assessment for brick production was produced as well as various empirical observations and recommendations concerning the feasibility of each repurposed plastic type examined.
Design and characterization of concrete masonry parts and structural concrete using repurposed plastics as aggregate
