On a global scale, there is an effort to deal with secondary raw materials and possibly reuse
them in the construction industry (CI) with a view to sustainable development. One promising
solution is to replace natural sand with a 0/1 mm fraction of stone dust, a by-product of stone
mining and processing. The focus of the project is the implementation of stone dust in the
portfolio of secondary raw materials as a kind of composites while maintaining or even
improving their properties for CI. The goal of replacing the binder or filler in cement composites
is ambitious given the obstacles in the deterioration of mechanical strength. The effort will not
only be to replace sand at the expense of performance but to modify the stone dust for mixing
water reduction while maintaining or improving final performance. Stone dust activation by
plasma/thermal treatment and crosslinking via carbon nanostructures will be experimentally
studied to unstress interfacial transition zones, and supported by micromechanical simulations.
Newly developed composites offer acceptable life cycle assessment.