A case study of two airport runways affected by alkali-carbonate reaction. Part one: Evidence of deterioration and evaluation of aggregates

Through the inspection of field concrete and detailed petrographic examinations of concrete cores collected from two airport runways, it was found that the main reason of the damages in the concrete structures was alkali-carbonate reaction. The test results of the newly developed autoclave method agreed well with the field performance of the aggregates used. It is suggested that the autoclave method is an effective method to evaluate the reactivity of carbonate aggregates though its general validity should be widely inspected.