Application of Thermally Treated Sewage Sludge in Blended Cements

Abstract

Chemical, physical, morphological, and mineralogical analysis of sewage sludge originating from a waste water treatment plant in Patras, Greece, is presented in the paper. The sewage sludge is firstly dried at 70°C, then oven-burned at 700°C for two hours and milled. The thermally treated material is analyzed using XRF and XRD, the particle size distribution is determined by a laser diffraction method. A potential use of sewage sludge in blended cements is investigated on the basis of the measurement of mechanical and basic physical properties of pastes containing the sludge in an amount of up to 60% of the mass of cement. Experimental results show that the thermal treatment of pre-dried sewage sludge and its grinding provides a material that can be successfully applied as a partial replacement of Portland cement. At a production of blended cements for high strength concrete, an up to 20% cement replacement level can be recommended.