Utilization of Bituminous Sand in the Production of Eco-friendly Sandcrete for Sustainable Construction

Abstract

Abstract Sandcrete is a construction material composed of cement, fine aggregate, and water. The constituent materials are in great demand due to their use in various buildings. The increasing demand in turn has led to astronomical increases in the cost of procuring these materials thereby making it very difficult to meet the shelter provision requirement of the teeming population of a country such as Nigeria. There have been various attempts to address this issue by substituting different materials for river sand in the production of sandcrete, either entirely or in part, one such material which is used in this research is bituminous sand. Bituminous sands are composed of sands, heavy oil and clay that are rich in mineral and water. Ordinary Portland cement was mixed with both river sand (as control) and bituminous sand in 0, 10, 20, 30, 40 and 100% replacement levels. Seventy-two sandcrete cubes were cast in all for this study and tested for compressive strength. From the investigation, the samples compressive strengths increased with increase in curing age and decreased with increase in percentage replacement though at a different rate with the sample containing 0% bituminous sand and 100% river sand denoted SC0,100 gaining the highest strength of 8.59N/mm2 at the 28th day of curing. The SC10,90, SC20,80, SC30,70 and SC40,60 attained 98.5%, 50%, 42.3% and 3.5% more strength compared to the design strength at 28th day of curing, respectively. While the SC100,0 attained 43.5% lower strength compared to the design strength at 28th day of curing. This research has revealed the possibility of using bituminous sand for developing eco-friendly sandcrete for construction purposes for up to 0-40% river sand replacement with bituminous sand.