TECHNOLOGICAL REQUIREMENTS TO BUILD REINFORCED CONCRETE STRUCTURES HIGHLY RESISTANT TO AGGRESSIVE COASTAL ENVIRONMENT OF CUBA.

Abstract

Reinforced concrete structures exposed to aggressive coastal environment of Cuba have presented service life term much lower than fifty years. Deterioration problems are mainly due to high intensity of atmospheric corrosion phenomenon in the reinforcement steel embedded in reinforced concrete. Costs in the maintenance and repair works in reinforced concrete structures continue to be very significant. Average annual values of chloride deposition rate transported in the marine aerosol occupy the third place worldwide specifically in zones very near from the sea. However, due to high levels of relative humidity, Cuba occupies a supreme place worldwide in the obtaining of Corrosivity categories of the atmospheres between very high (C5) and extreme (CX) in the coasts north and south. All this justifies the obtaining of innovations based on the technological requirements regarding with the concrete quality increase to build reinforced concrete structures highly resistant to aggressive coastal environment in Cuba. Results obtained are allowing nowadays, for all enterprise and entities in the country in the construction field to carry out the design, construction and investment works with the technological requirements that allow to increase the durability of the reinforced concrete structures with service life term higher of 50 years for all the built heritage and that is built, without additional costs in repair work.