Title:
Transforming Agricultural Residues into High-Performance SCMs through High-Energy Ball Milling
Author(s):
Brown
Publication:
Web Session
Volume:
ws_S25_Brown.pdf
Issue:
Appears on pages(s):
Keywords:
DOI:
Date:
3/30/2025
Abstract:
Despite the abundance of ashed agricultural residues containing up to 90?wt.% silica as potential supplementary cementitious materials (SCMs), high water demand limits their use by compromising fresh-state workability and mechanical performance of concrete – a particular challenge for countries with large agricultural sectors and low production of other industrial SCMs. To address this critical challenge, we have developed innovative processing methods that not only sequester CO2 but also eliminate fresh-state workability issues associated with ash-based SCMs. This presentation will share our latest results on the application of these methods to rice hull ash, demonstrating the production of high-strength concretes reaching 8,000?psi after 28 days at replacement levels of 20?wt.%. These results are benchmarked against improvements achieved from non-CO2 milling processes, highlighting the superior effectiveness of our CO2-assisted method. By enabling the manufacturing of high-performance SCMs from agricultural residues, our findings offer a viable pathway to utilize abundant waste materials in concrete production, addressing environmental and performance challenges globally.