Effect of printed circuit board dust on the workability and mechanical properties of self-compacting concrete: A preliminary study

Electronic waste has had an adverse impact on the environment in this era of fast electronic technology advancement and rapid consumption growth. Therefore, awareness and focus on the sustainable disposal of electronic products should be raised. The objective of this research is to study the feasibility of using the dust from the printed circuit board manufacturing process (PCB dust) as a binder to replace ordinary Portland cement (OPC) for manufacturing of self-compacting concrete (SCC). All of the seven SCC mixtures were obtained by replacing OPC with PCB dust by the volume ratio of 0%, 5%, 10%, 15%, 20%, 25%, and 30% respectively, then the workability and the properties of hardened concrete were investigated. From the experimental results, it can be seen that the workability of SCC tends to decrease with the PCB dust replacing increases, and clear that SCC tends to block during the flow and segregate. The engineering properties of hardened concrete indicates that the efficiency decreases as the amount of PCB dust increases. The highest 28-day compressive strength obtained is about 54 MPa at 5% replacement level and tends to decrease between 11.49% and 57.44% at replacement level between 5% and 30% by volume, when compared to the control mix. However, when SCC is mixed with 20% of PCB dust, it can provide a compressive strength of more than 50 MPa after 180 days. The results of the study point out the possibility of recycling PCB dust as a new filler that can be utilized to reduce the consumption of natural materials.