This research aimed to identify the link between the chloride penetration behavior of concrete made from various types of recycled aggregate from three main sources—building demolition waste (B-RCA), laboratory waste (L-RCA), and precast concrete waste (P-RCA)—and the 28-days compressive strength of natural aggregate concrete with the replacement ration 30%, 60% and 100% respectively. The results of the study revealed that the quality of recycled aggregate waste significantly impacted concrete behavior. To elaborate, finer aggregate potentially increased the inter-facial transition zone (ITZ), which is the weakness part of concrete, resulting in the concrete having less compressive strength as well as increasing amount of chloride ion penetration thought rapid test. In this research, an image processing technique, which is a simple method, was used to quantify the ITZ area of concrete. It was found that concrete with low compressive strength and high permeability values had an ITZ area significantly more than other types of concrete.

Construction and Demolition Waste (CDW), especially laboratory waste and concrete debris from construction, manufacturing errors, and demolition of existing structures, is posing challenges to the urbanization. As nowadays the aforementioned waste is disposed in landfills, this diminishes the development opportunity of cities. Although there are standards and research pointing out the application of recycled concrete aggregates in proper proportion, the theory has never been put into practice. This research aims to present feasibility of applying recycled aggregates through Bangkok’s economic perspectives. It is found that the investment in recycled aggregate plants takes nine years of payback period. Besides, the sensitivity analysis suggests that implementing certain strategies, such as imposing a landfill tax increase and applying dumping fee will significantly shorten the payback period of recycling business.