Designing Concrete Mixtures with RCA

The use of recycled concrete aggregates (RCA) in new concrete can help to reduce landfilling, improve economics of concrete, and supplement dwindling aggregate supplies in urban areas. The New York City Department of Transportation (NYCDOT) has calculated that they spend $1.45 million/year to dispose of demolished concrete, and has invested in crushing units to produce RCA but have not yet developed a design process for using the material as a replacement aggregate. The primary goal of this proposal is to validate and improve a novel RCA design methodology through both experimental and computational methods. The intended outcome of the project is to provide guidance to NYCDOT on using their home developed RCA in concrete cast as a part of the sidewalk replacement work. Given adequate performance and cost effectiveness, the knowledge and design tools developed for the sidewalk program could then be deployed to more advanced infrastructure including pavements and bridges.