## 1 Introduction  
Environmental pollution has been a major concern around the world today. The primary reasons are the emission of CO\({}_{2}\) in the atmosphere, depletion of natural resources and uncontrolled production of wastes that are dumped eventually in the environment. The construction industry is also responsible for environmental pollution. It cannot be ignored that cement is the most widely used material in construction activities. According to a study, the cement industry alone is emitting about 7% of the total greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions [1]. The constructional activities around the globe are growing every year to meet the infrastructural demand. It is estimated that more than 4 billion tons of cement is manufactured each year globally [2]. The production activities of cement are responsible for an enormous amount of GHG emissions into the environment due to use of energy. i.e., the fuel and raw material transformation. According to an estimate, about 1.6 tons of natural resource in the form of raw material is depleted to produce one ton of cement that leads to an emission of one ton of CO\({}_{2}\) in the environment [3]. There are global campaigns to encourage the development of environment-friendly construction material that can serve as a sustainable alternative to conventional concrete construction. The basic principles to produce an eco-friendly material are restriction to the consumption of natural resources and deploying a strategy to reduce the emission of CO\({}_{2}\) into the atmosphere [4]. On the other hand, there has been a significant increase in the generation of waste materials from industries, such as fly ash (FA) from coal power plants; molten slag (SG) from steel and iron industries; red mud from the alumina industry; dolomite, silica powders, and limestone dust from quarrying operations; ceramic wastes from the ceramic industry; and mine tailings from the mineral industry. This has become a challenging task for the environmentalists and researchers to dispose of or manage these wastes and develop alternatives to traditional ordinary Portland cement (OPC) concrete [5]. Geopolymer concrete (GPC) has emerged as an innovative solution that can fully avoid the usage of cement and endorse the effective use of waste materials [6; 7; 8]. GPC, also kNown as an earth-friendly concrete, is produced by activation of aluminosilicates, which are mainly derived from industrial wastes, such as FA, SG, ceramic wastes, red mud, limestone, dolomite, and silica powders [9; 10; 11; 12; 13]. FA, a waste product from coal power plants, and SG, a waste product of steel and iron industries, have been extensively used to produce GPC with an established good performance [14; 15; 16; 17; 18]. However, doubts persist about stability of the delivery of a good quality FA, since shortages in the supply of FA have been faced in some parts of the world due to strict regulation around coal-fired power stations [19]. Similarly, the annual global supply of SG is fairly limited while comparing to the annual requirement of concrete for global construction activities. It is very important to find alternatives for FA and SG to be used as precursors in the production of GPC due to shortages in supply of other source materials, such as FA and SG. Therefore, all the existing alternative raw material options should be explored in pursuing sustainable alternatives to conventional concrete construction. One such raw material is quarry rock dust (QRD) in the form of limestone, silica, and dolomite powders. It can be defined as the residue or waste material formed during quarrying/crushing of large parent mass rock to produce aggregates [9; 20]. The quarrying operations account for more than 15% of the waste dust of the total aggregate production [21]. These wastes are not biodegradable and produce environmental pollution, leading to health hazards. The storage and dumping of these wastes without treatment or recycling can trigger severe environmental challenges.