h i g h l i g h t sConcrete with cement replaced with waste materials fosters sustainable development. High volume replacement of PC with pozzolans greatly enhances concrete durability. The particle size of pozzolans significantly affects its performance in concrete. GGBS and POFA have superior performance as PC substitutes at high percentages.

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The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) recognize the dominance of infrastructure as a panacea for the nation’s development to improve the quality of people’s lives. In Nigeria, inadequate infrastructure has impaired the prospect of attaining some of these SDGs. Some of the identified barriers causing the poor implementations of SDGs in Nigeria include poverty, poor accountability, inadequate domestic water supply, poor energy supply, poor human capital development initiatives, poor transportation and telecommunication networks, illiteracy level, and environmental degradation. But while the SDGs are a non-enforced agreement, the way and manner of implementation and the conditions under which the state acts in accordance with the agenda were not properly spelled out. However, the success of the SDGs in Nigeria requires commitment from government at all levels to provide adequate funding, financial prudence, stable polity, sound policies, availability of functional infrastructural facilities and ensuring value for money. This will result in achieved opportunities such as the establishment of new businesses, boosting of employment rate, ample growth opportunities, enhance risk-adjusted financial returns to investors, an increase in the rate of youth and adults in formal education and non-formal education, and promoting environment friendliness. This review further recommends that government should address the challenges faced in the area of power, telecommunication, corruption and access to agrarian areas in the country in order to have an inclusive infrastructural development that is positively driving growth. Moreover, assessment of projects should include initial capital investment, operational cost, maintenance, and disposal of the asset which will guarantee more sustainable infrastructure projects that are likely to perform much better through the lifecycle. Thus, successfully achieving the SDGs must involve innovative approaches to infrastructure financing and sustainable public procurement.

Sustainable transport system must be supported by resilient infrastructure such as bridges. Bridge is an essential transportation structure that offers unique solutions for road and rail traffic to cross rivers, gorges and difficult ground conditions or for reducing conflict points in transportation system by carrying one mode of traffic over the other. Due to its pronounced economic importance to the society, bridge design aspects must go beyond the physical bridge structures and must cover all the factors that impact on the safe operation throughout its serviceable life span. The environment and the obstacle it crosses, the soil which carries it, the self-weight, imposed dead weights and the moving live loads must be adequately taken care of. The considerable conflicting factors of the site’s soil characteristics, river hydrology, ecosystem environmental impact, aesthetics, historical and archaeological impacts, permanent and transient loads, construction technologies and construction materials bring together a vast expertise of professionals. These sizeable factors must be well managed and harnessed by the vast team of experts involved to guarantee a positive outcome. The vast decay of Nigerian transport system is visible in all complimenting infrastructure including bridges. Cases of bridge collapse abound in Nigeria within the last decade. This research studies the failure trends of bridges in Nigeria and forty-five documented cases are considered for the research. Structural health monitoring approaches were combined with statistical measures to assess the causes and to proffer solutions to the failure trend. Poor maintenance, torrential rainfall/flooding, terrorist attacks, faulty design, poor materials and construction quality and truck overloading were found to be the major causes of bridge failures in Nigeria.

The construction industry is currently the second largest consumer of synthetic FRP products. Increasing environmental awareness and the push for sustainable development fuels the drive to develop high strength natural fibres and bioplastics that can replace the conventional synthetic FRP components. Lignocellulosic plant fibres have considerable high strength and they are currently being used for non-structural applications in various industries. With proper fibre selection, the right fibre orientation, optimal fibre aspect ratio and good interfacial adhesion property between fibre and matrix, natural fibre reinforced polymer (NFRP) composite can be developed for structural applications. This review discusses NFRP composite in terms of its constituents, the fibre-matrix interaction, its manufacture and its use for strengthening of reinforced concrete (RC) beams.