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The massive depletion of natural resources, together with the inefficient use of end-of-life materials, results in the generation of vast amounts of waste. The waste material recycling poses a challenge for the present generation and alteration of current material streams needs to be reconsidered to mitigate the consequent environmental burdens. The construction industry produces several millions of tons of brick debris which remain landfilled or, at the best, are used as a substitute for natural aggregates. Howev...

This article is focused on the alkali activation of aluminosilicates prepared from industrial waste obtained from the final grinding of bricks during their production. The ceramic waste powder as a precursor with water glass-sodium hydroxide mixture as activator are utilized for the production of alkali-activated aluminosilicates, which represent a promising way for design of cement-free environmentally friendly binders. Usage of such materials in building industry for development of new materials have a very good...

Nowadays, the best solution of radioactive waste management seems to be its deposition in deep repositories. However, construction of these repositories brings new issue for civil engineers. The most important one is elimination or inhabitation of radionuclide release in the environment. Therefore, new kinds of building materials have to be developed. This article is focused on improvement of the most utilized and the most common material -concrete. The main idea of this study was to improved radionuclides sorptio...

Geopolymers are alkali-activated materials produced by mixing silicate and aluminate phases containing minerals or aluminosilicates. This reaction results in stable polymeric networks of aluminosilicates. Nowadays, geopolymers have become very popular since they are seen as a potential alternative to ordinary concrete-based materials. They can be produced with the utilization of a variety of waste products. Therefore, the development of these materials can help to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from the productio...

Several concrete mixtures suitable for constructing engineered barriers in radioactive waste disposal facilities are designed and tested. The mix design is based on the utilization of a natural sorbent acting, at the same time, as supplementary cementitious material replacing a part of Portland cement and fine filler capable of radionuclide absorption and fixing. A representative set of engineering properties of the hardened concrete mixes is determined, including the pore size distribution, bulk density, matrix d...