Sustainability aspects of cement-based material blended with micronized sand

Concrete is one of the most important construction materials in the world. However, Portland cement, one of the constituents of concrete, is responsible for about 5-10% of global CO2 emission. From sustainability point of view, it is important to search for materials which can be used to reduce or to replace Portland cement in concrete. In this study, micronized sand, with high purity SiO2, has been selected as cement replacement. Environmental impact of micronized sand was evaluated and compared with Portland cement. The footprints showed that micronized sand has much less impact than cement on environment. In all categories of sustainability, the environmental impact of sand was 2 orders of magnitude lower than that of Portland cement. It was found that the use of micronized sand as cement replacement gave a big contribution in the category “global warming”, i.e. reducing CO2 emission.