A Study on Effect of Partial Replacement of Cement by Fly Ash in Conventional Concrete

Today construction engineers all over the world are looking for an alternative to replace cement as a binding material in concrete by a material which would have good binding properties, easily available, reduce the overall cost of production, and at the same time would be environmental friendly. In modern construction industry, fly ash is an excellent alternative to meet all such required properties and has been widely accepted. In view of global warming, every effort is being made to reduce the emission of CO 2 to the environment. Cement manufacturing industries are major contributor in the emission of CO 2 as for every one ton of cement manufactured, one ton of carbon dioxide is released. By replacing cement with a material of pozzolanic characteristic, such as the fly ash, the cement and concrete industry together can meet the growing demand in the construction industry as well as help in reducing the environmental pollution. The main objective of this paper is to determine the behavior of fly ash, when it is used at varied percentage replacements in concrete as a replacement to cement. The concrete with 0, 12, 24, and 36% cement replacement by fly ash were produced in this research. Workability tests, Compressive strength tests, split tensile tests, flexural strength tests and water absorption tests were performed on a prepared samples. The results obtained are discussed and compared graphically. When 12% fly ash was used, it was seen concrete behaved better than any other case in respect to its long term strength parameters development.