Geopolymer concrete as a cleaner construction material: An overview on materials and structural performances

Abstract

The manufacture of ordinary Portland cement (OPC) produces a lot of CO2 in the atmosphere. Researchers have recently focused on exploring the behaviour of geopolymer concrete (GPC) as an alternative to Portland cement concrete (PCC) in micro and macro dimensions. Geopolymers (GP) are innovative cement-based materials that could totally replace OPC composites. Geopolymer composites (GC) have a reduced carbon footprint and utilize less energy than OPC. The construction industry's main concerns are material characteristics and the performance of reinforced concrete (RC) structural components. Therefore, this review paper is going to look at some important material properties, like fresh characteristics, compressive strength, splitting tensile strength, flexural strength, and modulus of elasticity, as well as the evidence of the structural behaviour of GPC beams. According to the findings of this review, GPC offers similar or superior fresh and mechanical properties to conventional concrete composite. In addition, it was mentioned that GPC might be utilized to design GPC members securely in terms of their strength capabilities and standard codes of practice. Nevertheless, further study is suggested to include more detailed and cost-effective design methods for the potential use of GPC for large-scale field applications.

Keywords

• Geopolymer concrete (GPC)
• Fresh properties
• Mechanical properties
• Flexural behaviour
• Shear behaviour