Bio-deterioration of concrete, which is very common in sewer system and waste water treatment plant, results in significant structure degradation. Normally, the process can be described by the two following parts: 1) Biochemistry reactions producing biogenic aggressive species in biofilms which are spread on the surface of concrete. As one of the most significant biogenic acid in sewer pipes, sulfuric acid (H2SO4) is produced by sulfur oxidizing bacteria (SOB). 2) Chemical reactions between biogenic aggressive species and cement hydration products which is responsible for concrete deterioration. A reactive transport model is proposed to simulate the bio-chemical and chemical deterioration processes of cementitious materials in contact with SOB and H2S or sulfuric acid solution. This model aims at solving simultaneously transport and biochemistry/chemistry in biofilms and cementitious materials by a global coupled approach. To provide an appropriate environment for SOB to grow, the surface neutralization of concrete (i.e., the absorption of H2S and aqueous H2S corrosion) is considered. To obtain the amount of biogenic H2SO4, the bio-oxidation of H2S by the activation of bacteria is simulated via a simplified model. To provide a suitable environment for SOB to grow, the abiotic pH reduction of concrete process is introduced. The production rate of H2SO4 is governed by the pH in the biofilms and the content of H2S in gas.It is assumed that all chemical processes are in thermodynamical equilibrium. The dissolution of portlandite (CH) and calcium silicate hydrates (C-S-H) and the precipitation of gypsum (C¯S H2) and calcium sulfide are described by mass action law and threshold of ion activity products. To take into account the continuous decrease of the Ca/Si ratio during the dissolution of C-S-H a generalization of the mass action law is applied. By simplifying the precipitation process of gypsum, a damage model is introduced to characterize the deterioration of concrete due to the swelling of gypsum. Thus, the porosity evolution and deterioration depth during deterioration process are taken into account. Only diffusion of aqueous species are considered. Different diffusion coefficients are employed for various ions and Nernst-Planck equation was implemented. The effect of the microstructure change during deterioration on transport properties is considered as well. For both biofilms and cementitious materials, the balance equations of total mass of each atom (Ca, Si, S, K, Cl) are used to couple transport equations and (bio-)chemical reactions. The model is implemented within a finite-volume code, Bil. Following the introduction of principle of the finite volume method, the coupling of the bio-chemistry process in biofilms and chemistry process in cementitious materials is illustrated. By this model, some experiments reported in literature, including chemical immersion tests (statical solution condition and flow solution condition) and microbiological simulation tests, are simulated. The numerical results and the experimental observations are compared and discussed. The influence of properties of cementitious materials (initial porosity, carbonated layer, etc.) and environmental factors (concentration of H2SO4, content of H2S, etc.) are investigated by this model as well. Furthermore, a long term predictionis conducted
Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:CCSD/oai:pastel.archives-ouvertes.fr:pastel-00985468 |
Date | 03 December 2013 |
Creators | Yuan, Haifeng, Yuan, Haifeng |
Publisher | Université Paris-Est |
Source Sets | CCSD theses-EN-ligne, France |
Language | English |
Detected Language | English |
Type | PhD thesis |
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