Potential use of date palm ash in cement-based materials

Abstract

An increasing interest on using agricultural waste in producing quality building materials has been noticed for a negative impact of available cement binder due to its high energy consumption and excessive greenhouse gas emission in manufacturing process. Hence, this paper presents an experimental investigation on the mechanical, durability and microstructural performance of date palm ash (PA) with varying dosage. Mortar and concrete specimens were cast at 10%, 20% and 30% replacement of ordinary Portland cement (OPC). The optimum dosage and performance of date palm ash based mortar and concrete specimens was evaluated by measuring the compressive strength up to 360 days while rate of water absorption and rapid chloride permeability tests after 28-day curing. Further, the amount of hydration product was determined by Thermogravimetric Analysis (TGA), respectively in order to validate and justify the test results. The outcome of all test properties indicated that the mixtures prepared with 10% dosage of PA in mortar and concrete was optimum that effectively utilizes more Ca(OH)2 and produces additional CSH gel in improving the overall quality of concrete. Keywords: Date palm ash, Mortar, Concrete, Compressive strength, Permeability, TGA