Desorption and use of saturated lightweight aggregate in internal curing

Roughly 20 years ago there was a brand new concrete-curing concept presented in the U.S. based on providing "extra curing" water from inside the concrete. The extra water shoul be added to concrete during mixing, but is bound to some kind of carrier, so it does not alter the water-cement ratio. This technique, known as Internal Curing (IC) keeps the cement paste moist from the first moment when it normally would start to desiccate and is not mature enough to apply conventional means of curing. The durability and effectiveness of IC depend on the boundary conditions at the site as well as the properties of the carrier - in this case, Lightweight Aggregate (LWA), which, after the water soaking, replaces some part of the Normalweight Aggregate (NWA). This work deals with LWA (available on the European market) in the context of its properties affecting the efficiency of IC.