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Historical and old buildings with their distinctively decorated facades constitute an integral part of city centers or villages and create unique architecture. Most of these important buildings are attacked by refurbishment interventions with the use of incompatible modern rendering materials affecting appear of facades and causing their different service life-related problems. To ensure material compatibility between historical rendering materials and newly prepared alternatives requires special attention. Techni...

Old buildings, in particular, those coming from the first half of 20th century often suffer with increased dampness in masonry coming from different sources. Some of them, however, have aesthetically rendered valued facades which are worth saving. For the design of new alternative mortars for renovation interventions, it is essential to obtain properties of original renders. Mechanical properties of mortars are in general assessed on standardized test samples; however, this approach cannot be always well applicabl...

Green building materials are gaining attention for achieving carbon neutrality in civil engineering. To reduce CO2 emissions from cement, using low-cement or cement-free materials with local supplementary cementitious materials (SCMs) is promising. Blended cements with SCMs enhance long-term strength, but low-clinker blends often have low early strength. To address this, understanding the hydration of ordinary Portland cement is crucial. While C3S has been studied, the role of C3A, the most reactive component of c...

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...