the optimum dilution of effective microorganism mixed solution (emms) for microbed cement...

5/26/2018 THE OPTIMUM DILUTION OF EFFECTIVE MICROORGANISM MIXED SOLUTION (EMMS) FOR MICROBED ...

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1Seminar on Civil and Environmental Engineering Final Year ProjectsUniversiti Tun Hussein Onn Malaysia, 23-27 December 2013

THE OPTIMUM DILUTION OF

EFFECTIVE MICROORGANISM MIXED SOLUTION (EMMS)

FOR MICROBED CEMENT CONTAINING 10% EM. NO. 1

Muhammad Ikhwan Z.1, Nor Azizah A.

1, Noorli I.

2

1

Architecture and Design Engineering Department, Universiti Tun Hussein Onn Malaysia, Batu Pahat2Structural and Material Department, Universiti Tun Hussein Onn Malaysia, Batu Pahat

Corresponding E-mail :[email protected]

Abstract

Extensive application of additives in concrete showed the significant outcome in enhancing the concrete

properties. Recently, the new type of additives names Effective Microorganism (EM) has been introduced as the

new technology in concrete. Originally, EM was introduced by Dr. Teruo Higa, the Professor of Horticulture

from Japan to increase the quality and quantity of plants and fruits. However, the application of EM in cement

based material is still new. Thus, the feeling of curiosity drives the attempt to investigate the effect of EM in

improving the compressive strength of cement paste. EM No. 1:Bio Booster is selected based on the factor of

affordable price and its availability. Ten (10) percent of EM No. 1 is blended with 2% of molasses and 88%distilled water as the main proportion and it is called as Effective Microorganism Mixed Solution (EMMS).

This mixture is fermented in a plastic bottle for ten (10) days. This study focuses on the compressive strength of

cement paste specimens containing six (6) of different designation series of dilutions from EMMS. All

specimen cubes are placed in room temperature for the curing exposure before the compressive strength testswere conducted on 3, 7, 14 and 28 days. The result indicated that the addition of the dilution of 5%, 10% and

15% EMMS in cement paste increased more than 50% compressive strength of the control cement paste sample.

The highest compressive strength of cement paste indicated in the designation series of EMMS10 with

increment of 112% respect to the control sample. It can be concluded, the EMMS can be added up to 25% in

cement paste. Therefore, it might be able to be applied in the concrete mixes as an additive for future study withthe extensive investigation.

Keywords:Additives, Bio-Booster, Effective Microorganism, Microbed Cement

1.0 IntroductionAfter the invention of the additive, it is known to enhance the properties of concrete and

indirectly increase strength and it has been used extensively in the construction industry worldwide.The additives present in many different types and shapes, so that intensive research was carried out toenhance the application and the functions of additives. Recently, the new types of additives namesEffective Microorganism (EM) have become popular among the researches to be added in cement-

based materials. Originally, a horticultural Professor Dr. Teruo Higa developed the technology ofEffective Microorganism (EM) products in the 1970s at the University of the Ryukyus, Okinawa,Japan, (Higa, 1991) [1]. The main ingredients of EM are categorised into three types of organisms

namely areLactic Acid Bacteria, Yeast, Actinomyces andPhotosynthetic Bacteria(Nathan & Robert,2003) [2]. There are many studies (Fujita M (2000), Khaliq A. et al., (2006), Lee C.T. et al.,

(2008)) [3 - 5]- have shown that EM application indicated the significant outcome in livestock,agriculture, composting, bioremediation, algae control and more.

The potential of EM in cement based materials has been investigated by Nobuyuki et al.,(2004), Jamaludin et al., (2009), Noorli et al., (2012) and Andrew et al., (2013) [6 - 9]. Thepreliminary result revealed that the workability of fresh concrete and the initial strength increasedwhen EM is added as additives in concrete mix. In this present study, 10% of EM No. 1 was mixedinto 2% of molasses and 88% of distilled water. This mixture names as Effective Microorganism

Mixed Solution (EMMS). The selection of this type of EM was based on the laboratory testing thatwas conducted by Sustainable Soil and Water Ltd. [10], EM No. 1 is not dangerous because the tests

have proved that it is not a hazard to health, fire and their interaction is vacant.
mailto:[email protected]:[email protected]



2

The fermentation of EMMS was carried out in ten (10) days in order to activate themicroorganism content in the mixtures. Six (6) designation series of dilutions from EMMS weredesigned to investigate which dilutions that give the most enhanced effect to the compressive strengthof cement paste specimens. Therefore, it is intentions the present study to explore the utilization ofEM No. 1 in enhancing the compressive strength of cement paste.

2.0 Materials and Method

In this study the type of cement used is Ordinary Portland Cement (OPC). Distilled water usedin this study due to the contents of free chemical. The purpose is to avoid the harmful effects to thecontent of the effective microorganism.The effective microorganism (EM) type of EM.No-1 with thebrand name of Bio Booster has been used. It is in liquid form and procured in Pertubuhan PeladangJohor. This original EM-No.1 was an inoculant that could be activated and extended for economicreasons.Fermentation process is needed to promote the microorganism growth in EM.No-1.

2.1 Fermentation of Effective Microorganism

The EM-No.1 was an inoculant that could be activated by adding the EM-No.1 to a mixture ofdistilled water and blackstrap molasses, its main food source. The mixture was called EffectiveMicroorganism Mixed Solution (EMMS). The content of EM.No-1 and molasses added is keptconstant at 10 % and 2% respectively. All the EMMS has been mixed in a volumetric flask. After allthe content is well blended, it has to be stored in plastic bottles in room temperature in 10 days. ThepH of EMMS should less than 4 before it can use in mixing together into the cement paste.

Table 2:Main mix proportion of EMMS

Material Percentage (%)

EM No. 1 10

Molasses 2Distilled water 88

2.2 Dilutions of EMMS Content

The mixing method has been carried out by replacing optimum dosage of mixing water with theEMMS. The quantity of EMMS contents to be added in the cement paste is based on the consistencytest. From the main proportion of EMMS, the contents were diluted to six (6) percentage dilutions asshown in Table 3. As an example, the designation name of EMMS-5 defined as only five (5 percentdiluted from the main proportion of EMMS while EMMS-100 defined the contents of EMMS was

fully added without dilution into the cement paste. The purpose of introducing several dilutions ofEMMS contents is to investigate the effect of the EMMS dilution to the compressive strength of

cement paste.

Table 3: EMMS Dilutions Used

Designation Name Cement (kg) EMMS (ml) Distilled water (ml)

EMMS-5

6

90 1710

EMMS-10 180 1620

EMMS-15 270 1530

EMMS-20 360 1440

EMMS-25 450 1350

EMMS-100 1800 -

Control - 1800



3

3.0 Result and Discussion

3.1 Standard Consistency and Setting Time

These two (2) was conducted on the cement paste with hundred percent of EMMS (EMMS-100) and

without EMMS (control). Referring to Table 3, the percentage of EMMS required to achieve astandard mixture of cement is 2% higher than the control sample. It can be concluded that the testedcement requires 30% of the dry weight content of cement EMMS to produce standard consistency forcement mix. Therefore, the water cement ratio of 0.30 is chosen to use in for all different percentagesof EMMS dilutions in cement paste.

Table 3: Standard Consistency and Setting Time

The consistency of the cement paste is closely related to the setting time of the cement itself.Initial setting time is the time when the cement paste starts losing its plasticity properties. Based onthe data obtained, the initial setting time for the control sample is earlier than the samples containing

EMMS. This suggests that the mixture of cement paste containing EMMS can delay about 19 minutesthe time when the plasticity starts losing in the cement. This shows relatively good results for this

initial setting time because it can extend the time for transportation and placement of cement paste inthe mould.

While, for the final setting time is the time when the cement paste completely loses its plasticityproperties. The result shown that, the time for EMMS loses its plasticity is delayed about 20 minutescompared to control sample. Thus, it will give an impact of cement paste containing EMMS becauseit can delay few minutes to cement hardens sufficiently and attain the shape of the mould whencasting process. Therefore, both results show a good rate of reaction between cement and EMMS. It isimportant because it determines the rate of cement paste hardening.

3.2 Compressive Strength of Microbed Cement

The compressive strength tests of the cement paste specimen with and without EMMS wasconducted at ages 3, 7, 14 and 28 days. A total of 84 cube specimens had been prepared. Indetermining the optimal dilution content EMMS in cement paste, the value of the water cement ratiois 0.3 that has been derived from standard consistency test is used for all samples. The specimenswere cured in room temperature.

Figure 1:The effect of EMMS dilution to the compressive strength of cement paste

SampleStandard Consistency

(%)

Setting Time

Initial (min) Final (min)

Control 28 45 145

EMMS 30 64 165



4

Overall, it is clearly shown that the dilution of 5 percent to 25 percent of EMMS was able toenhance the strength of cement as shown in Figure 1.It can be referred to the results of EMMS-5 toEMMS-25. However, the content of EMMS-100 in cement showed lower performance than thecontrol sample. At age of 3 days, the results of cement paste compressive strength of the controlsample recorded readings 23.41 N/mm

2. Meanwhile, the cement paste sample containing dilutions of

EMMS-5, EMMS-10, EMMS-15, EMMS-20 and EMMS-25 gives a non-uniform reading patent of36.45 N/mm2, 46.24 N/mm2, 33.87 N/mm2, 32.83 N/mm2and 30.55 N/mm2, respectively. However,the strength of the EMMS-100 in the cement paste gave less impressive reading. Use of content 100%of EMMS would give dramatic effect on cement paste cubes because the results showed that less than1 N/mm

2with compressive strength. A cement cube containing EMMS-100 decrease by 95.11% from

control samples.

At the age of 7 days shows the results for samples EMMS-100 is 0.91 N/mm2

with relativelyslight increases from the sample at the age of 3 days, 0.64 N/mm

2. Whereas, for the other samples are

still showing an increase compared with control samples. The value of compressive strength at age7 days is 54.35 N/mm

2 for the EMMS-10 sample. For control samples, EMMS-5, EMMS-15, and

EMMS-25, showed a relatively uniform increase over the age of 3 days. Meanwhile, for samples

EMMS-20, it is the second highest value at age 7 days to 45.62 N/mm2.

There was little change in patent the graph at age 14 days. A dramatic increase recorded for thesample EMMS-5 and EMMS-15 from age 7 days to 14 days which gives 50.84 N/mm

2 and

48.13 N/mm2 with respect to control sample. For the cement paste containing EMMS-100, it stillshows the same declination patent of 90.78% against the control samples. For the cement paste withother mixtures, the compressive test results are not much of a difference. However, the cement pastewith a mixture EMMS-10 still gives the highest strength readings with a small increase of55.78 N/mm2at 14 days. The increment of compressive strength for EMMS-10 is about 89.15% with

respect to control sample. Meanwhile, the increase in strength of the EMMS-20 and EMMS-25continues to give a consistent reading of 45.49 N/mm

2and 42.38 N/mm

2.

As has been noted, of compression test for this study is up to age 28 days. In fact, the cementpaste containing EMMS-10 still provide the maximum strength of 63.16 N/mm2with an increase ofmore than 100% compared to control samples. Meanwhile, the cubes containing EMMS-5 alsoshowed rapid improvement. Apart from the increase in the percentage of compressive strength ofmore than 100% for EMMS10, an increase of more than 50% was also recorded for samples EMMS-5, EMMS-15 and EMMS-20. However, the strength is slightly increased in time for EMMS-100,which replaces 100% of the water content in the cement paste. The compressive strength ofEMMS-100 remained low compared with the control sample despite increasing the age of cubes.

4.3 The Density of Cement Paste for 28-days

Density is a fundamental one of the physical properties of a material. In fact, it can be definedas the mass of unit volume can be expressed in kilograms per cubic meter. Figure 2 shows the density

of microbed cement on 28 days.

Figure 2:The relationship between compressive strength and density at 28 days



5

Figure 2 is plotted in order to find the relationship between the strength of the density of thecement paste containing EMMS in 28 days. Is very clearly seen that the density of EMMS-10 is thehighest among all the samples. Meanwhile, EMMS-100 has the lowest density. The percentagereduction between EMMS100 to EMMS10 in the cement paste mix was 10.64%. This figure answerwhy some of the cubes that containing EMMS-100 is brittle and easily cracked during the EMMS-100cubes was removed from the mould.Thereby increasing the density and gives the highest compressivestrength readings. This proves that the compressive strength EMMS-10 is the highest among allEMMS dilutions in the cement paste.

4.4 Summary of Test Results

It is clearly shown the dilution of EMMS in cement paste increased the compressive strength asshown in Table 4. In fact, all proposed EMMS dilutions up to 25% increased the compressive strengthof cement paste respect to control specimen. However, the application of fully EMMS content(EMMS-100) to be added in the cement paste is not suggested. The highest compressive strengthindicated in dilution of 10% (EMMS-10) with doubled strength compared to control sample. Thisresult is tally to the density 2034.67 kg/m

3of specimens for the same dilution.

Table 4:The compressive strength and density of control and microbed specimens

DesignationName

Average CompressiveStrength At 28 Days,

N/mm2

Percentage Over TheControl Sample,

%

Average Density at28 Days,

kg/m3

CONTROL 29.83 - 2005.33

EMMS-5 56.25 88.57 % above control sample 1984.00

EMMS-10 63.16 111.73% above control sample 2034.67



EMMS-25 40.7 36.44% above control sample 1936.00EMMS-100 4.82 0.84%below control sample 1792.00

Generally, all dilutions of EMMS own the high compressive strength. Although the sampleEMMS-25 exceed the strength of the control sample of 36% but it is still below 50% of thecompressive strength increment. The specimens containing dilution of 5% (EMMS-5), 10% (EMMS-10) and 15% (EMMS-15) and 20% (EMMS-20) showed an increase of compressive strength morethan 50% with respect to the control samples. The compressive strength of EMMS-5, EMMS-15 andEMMS-20 samples increased with 89%, 63% and 54% respectively compared to the controlspecimens.

While, the dilution of 10% EMMS in cement paste recorded the highest compressive strength atabout doubled with respect to control samples. By comparing the percentage of compressive strengthand density of control and microbed hardened cement for 28 days, it is clearly confirmed that thehighest compressive strength is EMMS-10 which is related to the highest density of the cement pastespecimen. Meanwhile, the lowest density of EMMS-100 indicated the lowest compressive strength ofcement paste. This pattern was similar to previous studies that stated the higher density contribute thehigher compressive strength.



6

5.0 Conclusions

In this present study, the following conclusion can be made;

i. Cubes of cement paste containing 100% EMMS content indicated the lowest compressivestrength. It was confirmed with the physical appearance of the cement paste, which contains

100% EMMS is easily cracked and brittle.

ii. The initial and final setting time of cement paste containing EMMS indicated longer timecompared to cement paste without EMMS. The consequence will contribute slower hardening rate

of microbed paste. The setting time was prolonged due to the retardant effect of EM and

molasses. Both materials consist of sugar contents which is one type of retarder that

slower the hardening rates of the resulted cement paste.

iii. The incorporation of EMMS into cement paste produced a higher compressive strength up to 28days. It seems all dilutions of EMMS showed the significant outcome in enhancing the

compressive strength of cement paste specimens. The maximum increase in compressive strengthoccurred at a dilution of 10% with the increment of 111.73% respect to control specimens. The

increase in compressive strength of 10% dilution of EMMS was associated with the increment ofdensity in cement paste. However, the lowest compressive strength indicated with the addition of100% EMMS. It was confirmed with the physical appearance of the cement paste, which contains

100% EMMS is easily cracked and brittle. Therefore, EMMS is not suggested to be fully added(100%) in cement paste because of no significant result found.

References

[1] Higa T. (1991), Effective microorganisms: A biotechnology for mankind, In: J.F. Parr, S.B. Hornick, &

C.E. Whitman (ed.) Proceedings of the First International Conference on Kyusei Nature Farming. U.S.

Department of Agriculture, Washington, D.C., USA, Pages 8-14

[2] Nathan S. & Robert A.P. (2003), Effective microorganisms (EM) and wastewater systems, Future

Directions for On-site Systems: Best Management Practice, Proceedings of On-site 03 Conference,

University of New England, Armidale, 30th September to 2nd October.

[3] Fujita M (2000), Nature farming practices for apple production in Japan. In Nature farming and

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Materials As A Partial Mixture Of Concrete. Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Johor Darul Takzim.

[8] Noorli, I , Hamidah, M.S and Kartini, K, (2012) Compressive strength of effective microbed concrete,

Malaysian Science and Technology Congress, Sime Darby Convention Centre (MSTC 2012), 1921

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[9] Tan Cheng Siong Andrew, Ibrahim Izni Syahrizal, Mohd. Yatim Jamaluddin (2013), Effective

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