A Comparative Study on Clay and Red Soil Based Geopolymer Mortar

Geopolymer mortar is cement less which is gaining popularity globally towards the sustainable development. It can be produced from mineral admixtures such as fly ash, clay, red soil with user-friendly alkaline-reagents. Production of Ordinary Portland Cement (OPC) requires large amount of energy as well as carbon footprint. It is shown that OPC emits approximately 5% of global CO 2 emissions annually, which works out to nearly more than ½ ton of CO 2 emission for every one ton production of OPC. So it is badly needed to reduce the global CO 2 which has encouraged the researchers to search alternative sustainable building materials those are available in locality with lower embodied energy and carbon dioxide emissions. Clay and red soil are the best selection for that and both are usable as an eco-friendly building materials also available in locality. So an attempt has been made to explore the possibility of using clay and red soil based mortar in construction industry. The composition and microstructure were characterized by x-ray fluorescence (XRF), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) &particle size analyzer. Studies were carried out for both materials with respect to compressive strength, ultrasonic pulse velocity, effective porosity and co-efficient of absorption. The results indicated that geopolymer mortar with clay and red soil can be used as an alternate construction material in the construction industry.