Effect of low carbon marble dust powder, silica fume, and rice husk ash as tertiary cementitious material on the mechanical properties and embodied carbon of concrete

The recent decade has seen a surge in study towards cost-effective, ecologically benign, as well as socially advantageous cement replacements. Alternatives include industrial and agricultural waste, which can be recycled, repurposed, as well as renewed. However, using these wastes as supplementary cementitious materials (SCM) saves energy as well as reduces cement use, which helps reduce CO₂ emission. Therefore, this research investigation is to use the silica fume (SF), rice husk ash (RHA), as well as marble dust powder (MDP) individually as SCM and combine as tertiary cementitious materials (TCM) for determining the fresh (workability), hardened (dry density, splitting tensile and compressive strength) and durability (carbonation depth, and water absorption) properties of concrete. In this regard, 345 concrete samples were made with 1:1.5:3 mix ratio and cured for 28 days. The outcome has been demonstrated that the workability, dry density, water absorption and carbonation depth of concrete is getting reduced with growing the SF, RHA and MDP as SCM and TCM in concrete. Besides, the compressive and split tensile strength are increased by 10.44% and 9.544% respectively at 9% of SF, RHA and MDP as TCM for 28 days. Besides, the embodied carbon of concrete is decreasing while amount of SF, RHA and MDP as SCM and TCM is increasing. It has been observed that the use of 9% TCM is offering good results for construction sector and reduce the consumption of cement in concrete which helps to decrease the carbon emission in the environment.