A Review of Carbonate Minerals as an Additive to Geopolymer Materials

In Malaysia, several geopolymer materials were mainly from fly ashes, kaolin, metakaolin, and boiler ash which were mainly used to prosper sustainable development especially in the building and construction sector. Geopolymers can be classified as inorganic materials that were formed with the reaction between alminosilicate materials and alkaline solutions. This reaction causing a crystalline compounds mixture to form that toughen to become a novel compound through a process called geopolymerization process. These geopolymer materials have many admirable advantages, including high strength, small shrinkage, decent thermal resistance and good chemical resistance. Although they were used as a stand-alone material with great properties, combination with another material might be another way to improve their properties. A few studies had shown that the geopolymer material can achieve better properties with the addition of moderate amount of calcium-containing material to a geopolymer. The addition of carbonate materials can have insignificant effect on the geopolymer configuration and properties. Thus, this paper review the usage of carbonate materials for example Dolomite (CaMg(CO3)2) and Calcite (CaCO3) as an addition into these geopolymer material.