TY - CONF A1 - Hlavacek, Petr A1 - Gluth, Gregor A1 - Reinemann, Steffi A1 - Ebell, Gino A1 - Kühne, Hans-Carsten A1 - Mietz, Jürgen T1 - Corrosion of steel reinforcement in geopolymer mortars - carbonation resistance, chloride migration, and preliminary corrosion potential data T2 - EUROCORR 2017 N2 - Alkali-activated materials such as geopolymers are currently receiving a lot of attention because of their potential to be used as binders for concrete with advantageous engineering properties and reduced manufacturing CO2 emissions. Knowledge of the durability of steel in these concretes and related properties of alkali-activated materials is a prerequisite for their application as building materials, if they are to be used for steel reinforced elements. However, to date only limited data exists on this topic. The present contribution focuses on durability-related transport properties of geopolymer-based mortars (as model systems for concrete). We report results of accelerated carbonation, rapid chloride migration (RCM) and air permeability measurements as well as porosity data for fly ash-based geopolymer mortars, including mixes containing ground granulated blast furnace slag (GGBFS). In addition, we report polarization resistance data and corrosion potential vs. time curves for carbon steel bars embedded in two of the fly ash-based geopolymer mortars and a CEM I-based mortar (as reference). Despite comparable total porosities, the carbonation depths, the chloride migration coefficients and the air permeabilities of the mortars differed significantly. In general, the addition of GGBFS to the binders improved the performance (decreased transport coefficients); however, this was not found to be true for the air permeability in all cases. This latter effect can be explained by drying damage of the C-(A-)S-H gel in GGBFS-containing binders. On the other hand, low transport coefficients can also be achieved by optimization of the binder formulation without the addition of GGBFS, which is also reflected in the material’s air permeability. Thus, there exists no simple correlation between air permeability (of harshly dried mortars) and durability-related transport coefficients for the studied alkali-activated materials. The corrosion potential vs. time curves in combination with polarization resistance values reveal that the steel reinforcement in geopolymer mortars assumed a passive state. However, this happened considerably later than for steel in CEM I-based mortars. The free corrosion potential of carbon steel reinforcement in the geopolymer mortars had different values than the free corrosion potential values for the CEM I-based mortar for both the active and the passive state; possible reasons for this behavior are discussed. T2 - EUROCORR 2017 CY - Prague, Czech Republic DA - 03.09.2017 KW - Geopolymers KW - Alkali-activated materials KW - Corrosion KW - Steel reinforcement KW - Concrete PY - 2017 UR - https://opus4.kobv.de/opus4-bam/frontdoor/index/index/docId/41870 AN - OPUS4-41870 SP - Paper 87351, 1 EP - 7 AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany