Some Studies on Sustainable Utilization of Iron Ore Tailing (IOT) as Fine Aggregates in Fly Ash Based Geopolymer Mortar

This study presents the sustainable utilization potential of Iron Ore Tailings (IOT) as a replacement material against natural fine aggregates in the preparation of fly ash based geopolymer mortar. Low calcium fly ash is used as the source material and a mixture of sodium hydroxide and sodium silicate is used as the alkaline activator in the mix. Systematic studies such as setting times and compressive strength of the various mixes with different alkali binder ratio's were investigated in detail. It is to be noted that setting times of the mixes were found to be increasing with the increase in alkali binder ratio (0.4 to 0.8). Alkali binder ratio of 0.6 is found to be the optimum with respect to the compressive strength, irrespective of the type of fine aggregate. Scanning electron microscopy also reveals that microstructure of the fly ash based geopolymer mortar produced had a dense matrix with utilization of the Iron ore tailing. It can be concluded from the study that IOT is found to be a best alternative against the natural sand as a fine aggregate.