This is a cross departmental project with Dr Enrique del Rey Castillo (Senior Lecturer in Civil and Environmental) - one pair from C&M and one from C&E.
Concrete production is a top carbon polluter in the world, which inevitable has lead to companies and organisations around the world to investigate various ways to reduce that pollution. One of the more common tools is to claim that concrete can absorb carbon during the hardening process and in the long term through a process called carbonation. However, these claims are filled with cherry picking data, unrealistic assumptions, wishful thinking and often plain forgery. The actual carbon absorption has never been measured!
Through this project, the students will acquire extremely useful knowledge related to the environmental sustainability of concrete production, learn to use specialised equipment and tools to assess the carbon footprint of concrete, and contribute to the decarbonisation of Aoteaora New Zealand. This is a cross-departmental project in collaboration with A. Prof Steven Matthews from the Chemical and Materials Engineering department.
The C&M students will analyse a range of cemented materials, specifically studying the effect of CO2 adsorption on their changes in chemistry, structure and micro mechanical properties. Extensive use will be made of XRD, SEM, DSC & TGA to map the changes within the samples as they take up CO2 from the atmosphere. The C&E students will charaterise the physical effects of CO2 adsorption on the bulk concrete properties. The final aim will be to combine both "macro" and "micro" analysis to develop a mechanism of response as a function of cement composition. This is a very practical project with real world application!
Undergraduate
None
No lab has been assigned to this project