Along with the coal-fired power plants at the environmentalists’ target points, the ‘fly ash’ emitted form them as waste has always been a concern for both health and the environment.
So, to find a remedy to the fly ash hazards, researchers have come up with a better solution that can doubly benefit. They have developed recycled bricks made from fly ash, the coal-fired power plant waste.
The recycled and eco-friendly fly ash-bricks, which you can easily mistake as normal bricks, may prove even safer than predicted!
Contrary to some researchers’ prediction, claiming that it leaches minute amounts of mercury, it is found that the new fly ash bricks apparently actually do the reverse. They eventually are found to pull minute amounts of the toxic metal out of ambient air.
Henry Liu, a longtime National Science Foundation (NSF) awardee and the president of Freight Pipeline Company (FPC), which developed the bricks said,
Manufacturing clay brick requires kilns fired to high temperatures. That wastes energy, pollutes air and generates greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming.
In contrast, fly ash bricks are manufactured at room temperature. They conserve energy, cost less to manufacture, and don’t contribute to air pollution or global warming.
Though, about 25 million tons of fly ash emitted from coal-fired power plants is recycled each year — generally as building material additives like concrete — 45 million tons still go to waste.
Thus, these fly ash bricks would be an effective and beneficial solution to the waste, serving environment, health as well as building economy by standard brick manufactures.
