Adobe Stock / geargodz
Adobe Stock / geargodz

Ductile or bendable concrete, also known as Engineered Cementitious Composites (ECC), has been around since since the early 1990's. The desire was to create a concrete that retained its strength even after cracking. Researchers from Louisiana State University (LSU) have recently engineered a cost-effective ECC made of readily available ingredients that could soon be ready for mass producion. Ingredients include PVA fiber, fine river sand, and fly ash. Testing shows the mix to be superior to traditional concrete. The ECC was developed through a collaborative partnership looking to address the rapid deterioration of transportation infrastructure.

“ 'Compared to typical concrete, our cost-effective ECC material has about 300 times more deformation capacity, more than two times the flexural strength, and a higher compressive strength,' says Gabriel Arce, a senior research associate in LSU’s Bert S. Turner Department of Construction Management and principal investigator on the LSU ECC project. “The cost of our material is approximately 2.5 times that of regular concrete; typical ECC cost can be more than four times that of regular concrete."

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