Green alternative aggregate for cast stone products

Abstract

Rapid urbanization and infrastructural growth have increased the need for construction materials, placing more stress on natural resources and raising worries about carbon emissions. Cast stone, which has its own requirements and specifications, has also contributed to these issues. This research investigates the alternatives that are suitable to replace natural aggregate in cast stone products to reduce these effects. Both alternatives for cast stone product and regular structural concrete were considered all while ensuring the technical requirements of cast stone are met by each proposed alternative. The major requirements used to determine the suitability of the alternative were Compressive strength water absorption which was satisfied by 7 out of the 13 alternatives examined based on the UKCSA standard. To rank alternatives An automatically weighted TOPSIS method was used to rank alternatives based on 4 criteria: compressive strength as a representative of quality and durability, CO2e emission and replacement intensity to determine the alternative impact on the environment and finally, the cost to represent the possible economical barrier. With the focus being on manufacturing emissions and cost. Extensive data was collected on the performance of each alternative with selected criteria. The MCDM results were used to rank alternatives based on a uniform distribution of weighs and by adding that to the combined effect of three additional 3 nonuniform distributions that incorporate almost all the scenarios (73 cases) investigated by a Decision maker.