ARCTIC-ecocrete - Eco-efficient concreting for arctic region

The challenge:

Construction industry in the North has to endure long distances and harsh and cold climate. The lowest temperatures for economically feasible concrete works are set at around -10°C (but typically world-wide 5°C is defined as a limit for winter concreting). Works at lower temperatures are also possible but it requires significant amount of additional treatments and equipment to be used which increases the price and also risk substantially. Main challenge is that all of current winter concreting techniques are very energy consuming and they lead to high emissions of CO₂.

Solution and objectives:

In this project we develop environmental-friendly binder recipes and casting technologies targeting to subzero casting. The main goal of the project is to improve the sustainability of the arctic concreting and to develop innovative solutions to improve economic growth in the Northern area. Main aims of the project are

To develop novel environmentally friendly concrete mixtures utilizing local industrial waste materials for winter concrete works, as well as novel production technology for winter concreting
To enable concrete works below 5 °C and in extreme cases temperatures below -25 °C with long transportation distance from concrete plant to casting site reaching up to 100 km
Strengthen cross boarder cooperation, mobility possibilities and utilization of complementing competence within the construction industry through involvement of key industry players
Enhance innovation and improve competitiveness of cement and concrete industry
Reduce costs and energy consumption associated with building and maintenance of large infrastructure developments in arctic and sub-arctic regions
To create recommendation and guidelines for design and execution of concrete work in winter using developed in this project materials and production technologies.

Project duration:

1st August 2018 - 31st July 2021

Funded by:

Interreg Nord
Regional Council of Lapland

In media / publications:

Paper about fly ash carbonation and utilization as a construction material has been published in Journal of CO₂ utilization https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcou.2020.101203
Review article about different utilization possibilities of fluidized bed combustion fly ash has been published in Sustainability: https://doi.org/10.3390/su12072988
Article about frost resistance of mortar containing biomass fly ash has been published in Journal of Materials in Civil Engineering: https://ascelibrary.org/doi/abs/10.1061/%28ASCE%29MT.1943-5533.0003189
Article about the ARCTIC-ecocrete project has been published in “Betoni” journal: https://betoni.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/BET1903_92-95.pdf
Results about Saint Gobain's waste material have been published in Minerals Engineering: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.mineng.2019.106093
Article about fly ash utilization in construction is published in Uusiouutiset (in Finnish): https://www.uusiouutiset.fi/lentotuhkat-rakentamiseen/