Using drinking water treatment alum sludge to make greener and more durable concrete

Every year, more drinking water is needed for our growing population.

And in mainland Australia alone, we have about 400 drinking water treatment plants. As a byproduct of the purification processes, each site generates up to 2,000 tonnes of alum sludge per year. Unfortunately, disposing of alum sludge is expensive for water utilities companies and poses environmental risks.

To address this challenge, University of South Australia has partnered with South Australian Water Corporation and others to develop a way to use this alum sludge. They are incorporating it into an innovative supplementary cementitious material (SCM) to be used in concrete that would also go on to solve other industry problems. For example, such concrete could be a protective coating to reduce erosion of sewer pipes and could replace the finite resource of sand in commercial pavers. In this way, the project aims to provide and environmentally sustainable and economically viable solution to alum sludge.

PROJECT PARTNERS

• University of South Australia
• South Australian Water Corporation (SA Water)