Use of Sand Extraction Wastes in the Synthesis of Geopolymer

2. Nuclear Technology Development Center, Brazil

Abstract: Environmental degradation is a matter that worries the world's population. Therefore, there is an incentive to search for alternative materials, which in addition to enabling the reuse of dispersed substances in the environment, can replace the polluting materials already in use. Around 1972, Davidovits discovered the Geopolymer, an inorganic polymeric material like zeolites, composed of alumina and silica that restructure by alkaline activation. With the innovation of the Geopolymers, it is sought the incorporation of tailings of the mining in its synthesis. For that reason, the present work aims to study the influence of three factors on the calcination of kaolinite in metakaolin for the response “compressive strength” of the obtained Geopolymer. GH Areias Company, Inhaúma, Brazil, which has sand as its main extraction product and the clay, the waste of the process, provided the kaolinite used in this study. The factors studied were calcination time, heating rate and composition in the mass percentage. Through the Variance Analysis, it was possible to verify that the geopolymer with the highest percentage of metakaolin, 8h of calcination time and heating rate of 10°C/min presented higher values of compressive strength an average of 53,187 MPa.