1. Introduction
In Brazil, the sugarcane industry produces high amount of waste material named as sugarcane bagasse ashes (Faria, 2011). This waste is considered a non-biodegradable solid material, and is composed mainly of crystalline silica (Cordeiro, 2006). The final disposal of this solid waste material is a great challenge for the sugarcane industry. Currently, most of the sugarcane bagasse ash waste produced in Brazil has been mainly disposed as soil fertilizer. However, this solution is environmentally unsustainable. In recent years, the building materials industry has become a promising alternative for the recycling of solid waste materials (Badiee et al., 2008; Wei et al., 2009; Al-Zboon et al., 2010). Some reasons for this are: i) the ceramic industry utilizes large amounts of natural raw materials; ii) the building materials permit large variability of their chemical and mineralogical compositions; and iii) toxic substances could be inertized in the sintered ceramic matrix. A key issue for the recycling of solid waste material as an alternative raw material in the ceramic field is the knowledge of its chemical, mineralogical, and physical characteristics (Silva and Holanda, 2009). In this context, the present study focuses on the characterization of a sugarcane bagasse ash waste sample from south-eastern Brazil. In addition, the possibility of recycling of sugarcane bagasse ash waste into floor tile formulation has been examined.