Development of alternative wall tile compositions by using different industrial wastes

Effective utilization of industrial wastes plays an important role in reducing environmental impacts and efficient use of natural resources.It is important to investigate the usability of industrial waste materials in different application areas. In Türkiye, there are a huge amount of boron resources, and its mining wastes, together with the cutting wastes of the marble and/or limestones cutting factories. Beside these, fly ashes from the coal-burning thermic power plants, silica-rich raw material wastes used by the glass industry are in high amounts in some companies. Additionally, ceramic tile scraps of the ceramic tile manufacturers were also an important industrial waste. In this study, the potential of using boron mineral wastes from NW Anatolian boron deposits, Marmara Island limestone/dolomitic marble wastes, fly ashes obtained from Karabiga and sand wastes of the glass industry from Bilecik region in wall tile production was analysed. The waste materials were sampled on site and firstly their characterizations were carried out in the laboratory. Considering the results obtained in the later stages of the study, alternative wall tile compositions in which boron, fly ash, sand and marble wastes were used at a ratio of 50% were realized. The different body compositions were fired separately and their firing behaviours, moisture adsorption, water absorption characteristics were tested. The production of wall tiles using different industrial wastes will provide sustainable raw material management by providing less use of natural raw materials on the one hand, and it will reduce raw material costs and ultimately reduce CO2 emissions.