Production of new electromagnetic wave shielder mortar using waste mill scales

•Turkey is the second largest iron and steel producer in Europe.•In order to added value of the mill scale wastes, they were used in the mortars.•The novel mortars had an electromagnetic wave shielder properties.•This may be contributing the solve the scale storage problem of wastes. Electromagnetic (EM) wave shielder mortar can be produced by mixing cement, natural limestone, tap water with mill scale (mill scale-I and mill scale-II) which is one of the biggest disposal area problems of the iron-steel sector in Iskenderun, Hatay. In this paper, the detail analysis and information were presented on the influence of electromagnetic properties of mortars including iron steel industry waste mill scales to contribute the solving waste problems. The mortar samples were prepared using different volume of mill scales (5, 10, 15 and 30%) which were substituted with the natural fine aggregate. The mechanical properties (flexural and compressive strength) and the EM shielding properties (using the free space test method) of the mortars were compared with each other and also a control mortar samples. Our results indicated that the obtained mortars containing 15% mill scale had nearly same mechanical properties with the control mortar and they provided better solution for EM shielding. Especially, the mortar containing mill scale-II might be used to create novel construction material with shielding characteristics in entire wireless communication bands due to the cubic crystal structure and ferromagnetic properties of the mill scale-II. The mortar prepared using mill scale-I might be utilized to fabricate novel high strength radomes that behave as air in transmission respect. All experimental results point out that the waste mill scales are viable candidates for EM wave shielder for the buildings and will gain added value as well as solve the scale storage problem of the iron and steel industry.