With an increasing interest in recycling and reusing waste, there is a need to carry out research on
exploring ways to transform industrial wastes into construction materials. This paper attempts to explore
the feasibility of reutilizing textile effluent sludge (TES) for producing concrete blocks with a pretreatment
step. The lime-based pretreatment process was adopted to remove ammonia in TES which had
been found to lead to bad odor and strength loss of the concrete blocks. The concrete blocks were
prepared with an aggregate to cement ratio of 12, 10 and 6. The pretreated TES was adopted to replace
the fine aggregate at a mass ratio ranging from 0% to 30%. The compressive strength and drying shrinkage
values were determined to evaluate the performance of concrete blocks containing TES. The results
indicated that the lime-based pretreatment process can lower the ammonia concentration in TES
significantly. The concrete blocks with a lower TES content and lower ammonia concentration had higher
compressive strength and better volume stability. When the TES content in the concrete blocks was
about 10%, the concrete blocks with an aggregate to cement ratio of 10 can satisfy the minimum strength
requirement for non-load bearing applications. Meanwhile, the result of leaching test indicated that the
toxic trace metals present in textile effluent sludge could be stabilized/solidified and metal leaching from
the concrete blocks is not a concern.