The past and future of sustainable concrete: A critical review and new strategies on cement-based materials

Abstract The negative impacts of cement-based material (CBM) production are way bigger than ever expected. To illustrate the scale of this phenomenon, all the forests in the world, regardless of the fact that they are disappearing at an alarming rate, are not enough to offset even half the environmental impact (EI) of global aggregates and cement production. Thus, it is necessary to promote scientific research and guide more researchers and professionals in the construction industry to investigate the undiscovered sustainability paths, namely for concrete before and after end-of-life. For that purpose, a global and extensive review is made here to provide an overall view of concrete sustainability in all possible paths. Then, each path is organized as follows: (i) brief introduction, (ii) presentation of non-traditional materials and techniques that can be used for the selected strategy, (iii) their limitations and (iv) future trends. The study also identifies what is already known to avoid putting valuable research resources into redundant scientific studies. The following paths of concrete production sustainability were identified: mix composition (e.g. reduce the EI and resources use of binders, aggregates, water and reinforcement), materials manufacturing (e.g. new production techniques of cement, aggregates and steel bars), concrete mixing (e.g. mixer type and mixing method), on-site application (e.g. regular casting and digital concrete/3D printing), and in-service performance (e.g. increase the durability of reinforced concrete and carbon capture and thermal conductivity). On most of these paths, many studies have been made on the same non-traditional materials and techniques and similar outputs were obtained. Yet, many other non-traditional materials and techniques have not been explored before, or are incomplete in terms of the characteristics analysed. More than providing definite solutions, this contribution intends to open the minds of the readers to the vastly unexplored world of “green concrete”.