Use of ferrous industrial wastes as binding materials for construction

Abstract

Several ferrous and non ferrous metallurgical wastes, slags, powdered wastes, alcaline liquors, etc., can be used as binding materials to produce new building materials. These materials can be used in place of concretes made of cement, crushed stones, sand and gravel mixtures in several applications, road, industrial and airport foundations, etc. They are leaching resistant, so heavy metals do not migrate to the environment. These new materials, with a new structure, are obtained by mixing in right proportion of two or three industrial wastes or with mixtures of two of them and natural soils without any addition of traditional binders like cement and without heating. The main advantages are the solution of the problem of disposal of industrial wastes and the lower cost of the new materials, 5 to 6 times cheaper than traditional. Several examples of roads existing in Russia, even in Siberia and other northern regions, demonstrate the benefit of this process because after 20 years they still offer a good performance.