Assessment of the use of clam shell in concrete

Ninh Nguyen

Assessment of the use of clam shell in concrete

Ninh Nguyen

Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology, Vietnam

: Expert Opin Environ Biol

Abstract

Today, the demands for housing and public constructions in the world are increasing. It may cause high contruction material demands. The global market for construction aggregates is expected to increase 5.2 percent per year through 2015 to 48.3 billion metric tons. The Asia/Pacific region will register the largest increases in product sales, as construction activity will rise rapidly, particularly in China and India. To meet this need, the exploitation of the building materials are going strong, especially sand and stone exploitation. Overexploitation of natural resources can cause destruction of habitat. Therefore, it is suggested to research on finding out the source of new materials and environmentally friendly alternative to sand, stone building. Realizing the potential of replacing sand and stone of the clam shell by products in contruction, the study using experiment methods to evaluate the mechanical and physical - chemical characteristics of the clam shell. Clam shell was directly substituted for the natural aggregate at different percentage by mass in concrete mix grade 250. The experiment results showed that the clam shell can replace 30% sand and 15% stone by mass in concrete mix. The concrete from clam shells not only achieve the technical requirements, but also saving on material costs to more than 27% and having more environmental advantages than traditional concrete. Besides, the study also proposed to material collecting plans from different resources and development plans for this material.