A team from Dr BR Ambedkar National Institute of Technology, Jalandhar has brought international recognition by securing the bronze medal at the CASE-IN, an international engineering championship between BRICS and CIS countries, held in Moscow recently.
The Indian team, named “Pioneers in sustainable and innovative construction materials,” comprised Dr Kanish Kapoor, Tejinderpal Singh, Paramveer Singh and Anshul Sharma. Competing against internationally selected teams, the NIT-Jalandhar team secured third position and brought home the bronze medal for India. The team earned the opportunity to represent India after emerging as the top-performing Indian team in the preliminary online round of the championship.
The first stage of the competition witnessed participation from several Indian teams representing reputed institutions, including various IITs and NITs, making the qualification itself a significant accomplishment.
The team’s case study and presentation focused on “Sustainable and scalable use of geopolymer concrete in modern construction.” The proposed solution emphasised a strong adoption strategy for geopolymer concrete as a greener and more sustainable alternative to conventional cement-based concrete.
During the competition, the team highlighted that the manufacturing of traditional Portland cement contributes nearly 7 per cent of global anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions, making the construction sector one of the major contributors to climate change.
The proposed strategy highlighted scalable adoption strategy for geopolymer concrete to address this challenge, thus completely eliminating cement from concrete production and instead utilising industrial and agricultural waste materials such as fly ash, Ground Granulated Blast Furnace Slag (GGBS), rice straw ash and alkaline activators.
The team presented geopolymer concrete as a sustainable construction material capable of reducing environmental impact while also promoting waste utilisation and circular economy principles. Their proposal further focused on the scalability and practical implementation of geopolymer concrete for modern infrastructure development.
The final round of the championship in Moscow featured teams from BRICS and CIS nations, including Russia, China, Brazil, South Africa, Egypt, Indonesia, Ethiopia, Belarus, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, among others. The achievement is particularly noteworthy as the CASE-IN International Engineering Championship has been conducted since 2013 and this marks the first time an Indian team has secured a medal in the competition. The team expressed pride in representing India on a global platform.
