Edinburgh Napier University

  Fly ash from coal-burning power plants has been used extensively as a pozzolan and fine filler in concrete for many years. Laboratory experiments were performed investigating the effect of substituting the coal-based fly ash with chemically stabilised flue gas ashes (FGA) from waste incineration.

Two types of FGA were treated by the Ferrox-process, which removes the majority of the easily soluble salts in the FGA and provides binding sites for heavy metals in terms of ferrihydrite. Cubes of cement treated base layer materials containing 5% stabilised FGA were cast, sealed and cured for two weeks. Cylinders (diameter 100 mm, length 150 mm) were drilled from these cubes for tank leaching experiments. Duplicate specimens were subject to compression strength testing and to tank leaching experiments. The compressive strength of the CTB fulfilled the Danish requirements for CTB, i.e. strength more than 5 MPa after 7 days. The tank leaching tests revealed that leaching of heavy metals was not significantly affected by the use of chemically stabilised flue gas ashes from waste incineration. Assuming that diffusion controls the leaching process it was calculated that less than 1% of the metals would leach during a 100-year period from a 0.5 m thick concrete slab exposed to water on one side. Leaching of the common ions Ca, Cl, Na and SO4 was increased 3-20 times from the specimens with chemically stabilised flue gas ashes from waste incineration. However, the quantities leached were still modest.

These experiments suggest that FGA from waste incineration after Ferrox-treatment could be re-used in CTB without compromising the strength and leaching from the base layer.