1.

INTRODUCTION
Green concrete is a revolutionary topic in the history of concrete industry. This was first invented in
Denmark in the year 1998. Green concrete has nothing to do with colour. It is a concept of thinking
environment into concrete considering every aspect from raw materials manufacture over mixture
design to structural design, construction, and service life. Green concrete is very often also cheap to
produce, because, for example, waste products are used as a partial substitute for cement, charges
for the disposal of waste are avoided, energy consumption in production is lower, and durability is
greater. Green concrete is a type of concrete which resembles the conventional concrete but the
production or usage of such concrete requires minimum amount of energy and causes least
harm to the environment. The CO2 emission related to concrete production, inclusive of cement
production, is between 0.1 and 0.2 t per tonne of produced concrete. However, since the total
amount of concrete produced is so vast the absolute figures for the environmental impact are quite
significant, due to the large amounts of cement and concrete produced. Since concrete is the
second most consumed entity after water it accounts for around 5% of the worlds total CO2
emission (Ernst Worrell, 2001). The solution to this environmental problem is not to substitute
concrete for other materials but to reduce the environmental impact of concrete and cement. Pravin
Kumar et al, 2003, used quarry rock dust along with fly ash and micro silica and reported
satisfactory properties.
The potential environmental benefit to society of being able to build with green concrete is huge. It
is realistic to assume that technology can be developed, which can halve the CO2 emission related
to concrete production. With the large consumption of concrete this will potentially reduce the
worlds total CO2 emission by 1.5-2%. Concrete can also be the solution to environmental
problems other than those related to CO2 emission. It may be possible to use residual products from
other industries in the concrete production while still maintaining a high concrete quality. During
the last few decades society has become aware of the deposit problems connected with residual
products, and demands, restrictions and taxes have been imposed. And as it is known that several
residual products have properties suited for concrete production, there is a large potential in
investigating the possible use of these for concrete production. Well-known residual products such
as silica fume and fly ash may be mentioned. The concrete industry realised at an early stage that it
is a good idea to be in front with regard to documenting the actual environmental aspects and
working on improving the environment, rather than being forced to deal with environmental aspects
due to demands from authorities, customers and economic effects such as imposed taxes.
Furthermore, some companies in concrete industry have recognised that reductions in production
costs often go hand in hand with reductions in environmental impacts. Thus, environmental aspects
are not only interesting from an ideological point of view, but also from an economic aspect.
1.1. Environmental Goals
Green Concrete is expected to fulfil the following environmental obligations:

Reduction of CO2 emissions by 21 %. This is in accordance with the Kyoto Protocol of

1997.

Increase the use of inorganic residual products from industries other than the concrete
industry by approx. 20%.

Reduce the use of fossil fuels by increasing the use of waste derived fuels in the cement
industry.

The recycling capacity of the green concrete must not be less compared to existing concrete
types.

The production and the use of green concrete must not deteriorate the working environment.

The structures do not impose much harm to the environment during their service life.

2. GENESIS

Considering the time elapsed since the commencement of the use of concrete, green concrete is very
young a material. It was invented in 1998 in Denmark. The increasing awareness and activity to
conserve the environment and the realisation that concrete production too releases a considerable
amount of CO2 in the atmosphere were strong initiatives to catalyse the genesis of Green Concrete.
In 1997, the Kyoto Conference took place, in which several countries, after deliberating over the
then environmental conditions laid down several guidelines which would be the directive principles
to the participating countries on their environment related practices. The guidelines Kyoto
Protocol, as they are called, needed the countries to cut down their CO2 emissions to a certain
degree as assigned. The given goal has to be achieved by the year 2012. Since then several countries
started to focus on several available options but Denmark focused on cement and concrete
production because approximately 2% of Denmarks total CO2 emission stems from cement and
concrete production. Realising the necessity of such a technology and the prospects associated the
Danish government soon released a proposal. The proposal is in accordance with the International
and European Conventions and Protocol, with the nationally agreed goals that comply with these.
An important aspect is Denmarks obligation to reduce the CO2-emission as previously mentioned.
The proposal covers the following environmental aspects: Greenhouse effect, depletion of the
ozone layer, photochemical oxidation, eutrophication, acidification, materials harmful to the
environment and health, water and resources. The above mentioned priorities were included in a
large Danish projects about cleaner technologies in the life cycle of concrete products. Furthermore,
priorities have been made for the other participating countries, i.e. Greece, Italy, and The
Netherlands, and for Europe and the International World. Although there are differences in the
political environmental priorities, all agree that five environmental impacts given highest priority
are:

CO2

Energy

Water

Waste

Pollutants

These, coupled with the cost reduction benefits allured the concrete producers to incorporate
green concrete into their paradigm.
Cement and concrete may have an important role to play in enabling the developed countries to
fulfil their obligation to reduce the total CO2 emission by 21 % compared to the 1990-level
before 2012, as agreed at the Kyoto conference. This is because the volume of concrete
consumption is large. Approx. 1 m3 of concrete per capita are produced annually globally. The
CO2 emission related to concrete production, inclusive of cement production, is between 0.1-0.2
tons per ton produced concrete. This corresponds to a total quantity of CO2 emission of 0.6 - 1.2 m
tons per year. Approximately 5% of worlds total CO2 emission stems from cement and concrete
production. The potential environmental benefit to society of being able to build with green
concrete is huge. It is realistic to assume that technology can be developed which can halve the CO2

emission related to concrete production. With the large consumption of concrete this will potentially
reduce Denmarks total CO2 emission by 0.5 % (Glavind, 2000). The somewhat soft demands in
the form of environmental obligations result in rather specific technical requirements for the
industry - including the concrete industry. These technical requirements include among others new
concrete mix designs, new raw materials, and new knowledge (practical experience and technical
models) about the properties of the new raw materials and concrete mix designs. Due to growing
interest in sustainable development engineers and architects were motivated more than ever before
to choose concrete that is more sustainable. However this is not as straight forward as selecting an
energy star rated appliance or a vehicle providing high gas mileage. On what measurement basis
can engineers and architects compare materials and choose one that is more sustainable or specify a
material in such a way as to minimize environmental impact?
Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) seems to offer a solution. LCA considers materials over the course
of their entire life cycle including material extraction, manufacturing, construction, operations, and
finally reuse/recycling. LCA takes into account a full range of environmental impact indicators
including embodied energy, air and water pollution (including greenhouse gases), potable water
consumption, solid waste and recycled content just to name a few. Building rating systems such as
LEED and Green Globes are in various stages of incorporating LCA so that they can help
engineers and architects select materials based on their environmental performance or specify
materials in such a way as to minimize environmental impact.
Every 1 ton of cement produced leads to about 0.9 tons of CO2 emissions and a typical cubic yard
(0.7643 m3) of concrete contains about 10% by weight of cement. There have been a number of
articles written about reducing the CO2 emissions from concrete primarily through the use of lower
amounts of cement and higher amounts of supplementary cementitious material (SCM) such as
fly ash and slag. Table 1 has been developed based on data presented by Marceau et al, 2002.

The following observations can be made:

Since a cubic yard of concrete weighs about 2 tons, CO2 emissions from 1 ton of concrete
varies between 0.05 to 0.13 tons.

Approximately 95% of all CO2 emissions from a cubic yard of concrete are from cement
manufacturing and so it is no wonder that much attention is paid to using greater
amounts of SCM hence use green concrete.

3. ADVANTAGES OF GREEN CONCRETE

Green concrete has manifold advantages over the conventional concrete. Since it uses the recycled
aggregates and materials, it reduces the extra load in landfills and mitigates the wastage of
aggregates. Thus, the net CO2 emissions are reduced. The reuse of materials also contributes
intensively to economy. Since the waste materials like aggregates from a nearby area and fly ash
from a nearby power plant are not much expensive and also transport costs are minimal. Green
concrete can be considered elemental to sustainable development since it is eco-friendly itself.
Green concrete is being widely used in green building practices. It also helps the green buildings
achieve LEED and Golden Globe certifications. Use of fly ash in the concrete also increases its
workability and many other properties like durability to an appreciable extent. One of the practices
to manufacture green concrete involves reduction of amount cement in the mix, this practice helps
in reducing the consumption of cement overall. The use waste materials also solve the problem of
disposing the excessive amount industrial wastes. There are several other advantages related to
green concrete and can be summarized as below:
a) Reduced CO2 emissions.
b) Low production costs as wastes directly substitute the cement.
c) Saves energy, emissions and waste water.
d) Helps in recycling industry wastes.
e) Reduces the consumption of cement overall.
f) Better workability.
g) Sustainable development.
h) Greater strength and durability than normal concrete.
i) Compressive strength and Flexural behavior is fairly equal to that of the conventional concrete.
j) Green concrete might solve some of the societies problems with the use of inorganic, residual
products which should otherwise be deposited.

4. METHODS TO PRODUCE GREEN CONCRETE

4.1. Desirable properties in green concrete
Today, it is already possible to produce and cast very green concrete. Even a super green type of
concrete without cement but with, for example, 300 kg of fly ash instead can be produced and cast
without any changes in the production equipment. But this concrete will not develop strength, and it
will of course not be durable. Therefore, the concrete must include aspects of performance like:
a) Mechanical properties (strength, shrinkage, creep, static behavior etc.)
b) Fire resistance (heat transfer, etc.)
c) Workmanship (workability, strength development, curing, etc.)
d) Durability (corrosion protection, frost, new deterioration mechanisms, etc.)
e) Environmental impact (how green is the new concrete?).

Meeting these requirements is not an easy task, and all must be reached at the same time if
constructors are to be tempted to prescribe green concrete. A constructor would not normally
prescribe green concrete if the performance is lower than normal, for example, a reduced service
life. The new technology will therefore need to develop concretes with all properties as near normal
as possible.
4.2. Energy consumption during the production
4.2.1. Energy consumption in concrete mix design
The type and amount of cement has a major influence on the environmental properties of a
concrete. An example of this is shown in Figure 2, where the energy consumption in mega joules
per kilogram of a concrete edge beam through all its life cycle phases is illustrated. The energy
consumption of cement production make up more than 90% of the total energy consumption
of all constituent materials and approximately one-third of the total life cycle energy
consumption. By selecting a cement type with reduced environmental impact, and by minimizing
the amount of cement, the environmental properties of the concrete are drastically changed. This
must, however, be done while still taking account of the technical requirements of the concrete for
the type and amount of cement. One method of minimizing the cement content in a concrete mix is
by using packing calculations to determine the optimum composition of the aggregate. A high
level of aggregate packing reduces the cavities between the aggregates, and thereby the need for
cement paste. This results in better concrete properties.

Another way of minimizing the cement content in a concrete is to substitute parts of the cement
with other pozzolanic materials. It is common to produce concrete with fly ash and/or micro
silica. Both of these materials are residual products (from production of electricity and production
of silicon, respectively) and both have a pozzolanic effect. Thus, a material with large
environmental impact, i.e. the cement, is substituted with materials with reduced environmental
impacts. Although there is no guideline given by the BIS on the addition of above components, the
Danish Standards have laid down certain restrictions as given in Table 2.