Survey of the current status of sustainable concrete production in the U.S

Ruoyu Jin, Qian Chen and Alfred Soboyejo

Resources, Conservation & Recycling, 2015, vol. 105, issue PA, 148-159

Abstract: The wide use of concrete in construction has significantly impacted energy use and environmental quality. Fortunately, the emergence of sustainable concrete, often made with alternative or recycled waste materials, offers great opportunities to improve concrete sustainability. This paper studies the current status of sustainable concrete production in the U.S. through a questionnaire survey. It revealed that the surveyed companies varied largely in their recognition and adoption of supplementary cementitious materials (SCMs) and alternative aggregates (AAs). Of the various alternative materials available, the most widely used by survey participants were limited to the three SCMs (fly ash, slag cement, and silica fume) and two types of aggregates (lightweight and recycled concrete aggregates). Multiple benefits and barriers to the adoption of SCMs and AAs, e.g., concrete properties, cost, and local availability, were also disclosed by survey participants. Statistical comparisons identified differences in sustainable concrete production between ready mixed concrete suppliers and concrete prefabricators, as well as in its applications in structural and non-structural concrete components. The findings provide a better understanding of the U.S. sustainable concrete production and offer insights into how researchers can help address industry concerns about the implementation of sustainable concrete.

Keywords: Sustainable concrete; Sustainable development; Supplementary cementitious material (SCM); Alternative aggregate (AA); Waste; Construction (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921344915301105
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:recore:v:105:y:2015:i:pa:p:148-159

DOI: 10.1016/j.resconrec.2015.10.011

Access Statistics for this article

Resources, Conservation & Recycling is currently edited by Ming Xu

More articles in Resources, Conservation & Recycling from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Kai Meng ().