TABLE OF CONTENTS Approaching civil engineering materials from a physico-chemical point of view is probably the simplest way to bring together products that are extremely different in their design as well as in their use. However, it is not just the method but other economic, technological and scientific realities that brings them closer. To do this, we need to add the real environmental and health impacts that they could actually cause or likely to cause in the collective unconscious. We then come straight to the point of sustainable development, the concept which drives development and research in the beginning of the 21 st century.
In order to fulfill this need, the best solution was to ask experts to give account of their knowledge of different fields: engineers, teachers, PhD professors, architects, doctors. Their contributions are given below. The authors of the different sections are given in the Introduction to this book.
From the point of view of construction materials, plastics and by extension all polymers are in a situation where modesty is in vogue. They account only for 1% of the quantity of construction materials bought per annum in Europe. However, we can talk about economic reality today, because even if the tonnage is very small, we find it everywhere and especially in the creation of new materials: polymers become the major ingredient for the technological improvement of traditional materials.
We find them in products incorporated into cement...
