Ghafoor Sajid, Hameed Abdul, Shah Syyed Adnan Raheel, Azab Marc, Faheem Hamza, Nawaz Muhammad Faisal, Iqbal Fahad
Department of Civil Engineering, Pakistan Institute of Engineering and Technology, Multan 66000, Pakistan.
College of Engineering and Technology, American University of the Middle East, Kuwait.
Materials (Basel). 2022 Mar 18;15(6):2256. doi: 10.3390/ma15062256.
Water is one of the necessary ingredients for construction materials. Billions of gallons of clean water are wasted during the development of fired clay bricks. Similarly, the waste of clean water is a global issue. In this study, we develop fired clay bricks with the help of wastewater for the first time and compare these with clay bricks produced using groundwater, which is the conventional method. Both destructive (i.e., compressive strength (CS)) and non-destructive (i.e., ultrasonic pulse velocity (UPV)) tests are conducted on all fired clay brick specimens as per the American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM). Physical (i.e., dimensions) and durability (water absorption, efflorescence, etc.) tests are also conducted. All kinds of brick satisfied the standard requirements of physical and durability characteristics. Similar or better strength of bricks were achieved using wastewater. The study concludes that the testing results of wastewater bricks were significantly 15-25% higher compared with groundwater-fired clay bricks. A large amount of wastewater can be used to develop bricks, and clean water can be saved to attain circular economy goals. Therefore, this study will help not only in developing low-cost bricks but also in saving clean water.
水是建筑材料的必要成分之一。在烧制粘土砖的过程中，数十亿加仑的清洁水被浪费。同样，清洁水的浪费是一个全球性问题。在本研究中，我们首次借助废水研制出烧制粘土砖，并将其与采用传统方法使用地下水生产的粘土砖进行比较。按照美国材料与试验协会（ASTM）的标准，对所有烧制粘土砖试件进行了破坏性试验（即抗压强度（CS））和非破坏性试验（即超声波脉冲速度（UPV））。还进行了物理性能（即尺寸）和耐久性（吸水率、泛霜等）试验。各类砖均满足物理性能和耐久性特征的标准要求。使用废水烧制的砖获得了相似或更好的强度。研究得出结论，与使用地下水烧制的粘土砖相比，废水砖的测试结果显著高出15%至25%。大量废水可用于制砖，从而节省清洁水以实现循环经济目标。因此，本研究不仅有助于开发低成本砖，还能节约清洁水。
