New Trends in Sustainable Concrete and Its Structural Applications, 2nd Edition

Dear Colleagues,

Sustainability is very important to the continued growth of our society and human civilization, and thus, it is the hottest issue not only in engineering but in all fields. In particular, cement, a main constituent material of concrete, emits a large amount of CO₂ and other greenhouse gases, so it constitutes the most important axis of the sustainability issue. In addition, due to restricted natural resources, the constituents of concrete are gradually depleted. For example, the amount of aggregates is rapidly decreasing in most developed countries, so it is no longer possible to obtain high-quality aggregates, which leads to poor-quality concrete construction. To address this sustainability issue in concrete construction, new innovative technologies have been developed in the last decades. For example, various supplementary cementitious materials, such as fly ash, blast furnace slag, silica fume, and rice husk ash, are utilized to reduce cement usage. Recently, limestone calcined clay cement (LC³) is being spotlighted as one of the alternative types of cement with lower CO₂ emissions. Alkali-activated concrete is also being actively studied. Furthermore, recycled aggregates collected from waste concrete are a good example of waste recycling in the concrete industry to address the depletion of natural resources. Other examples of waste recycling are being introduced. All concretes that utilize these technologies can be called “sustainable concrete,” but sustainable concrete is not limited to just cement and constituent materials; it can be extended to technologies related to the entire cycle of concrete manufacturing, construction, operation, and disposal. Moreover, to utilize sustainable concrete more actively in the construction industry, it is of utmost importance to verify its compatibility as materials constituting structural members.

From these viewpoints, subjects that will be dealt with in this Special Issue will focus on recent trends in sustainable concrete research, and also case studies that prove the structural performance of sustainable concrete.

Prof. Dr. Seung-Yup Jang
Prof. Dr. Seung-Jun Kwon
Guest Editors

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• sustainability
• concrete
• CO₂ (carbon dioxide)
• GHG (greenhouse gas)
• supplementary cementitious materials
• alkali-activated concrete
• cement-free concrete
• recycled aggregates
• waste recycling
• structural performance