Environmentally efficient thermal and acoustic insulation based on natural and waste fibers

BACKGROUNDInsulations play an important role in terms of the reduction of energy consumption of buildings which is of key importance for environment protection and sustainable development. Current insulation puts significant strain on the environment both during the production of the material and after it has finished its service in the structure. Thus, more ecological options are insulations from easily renewable, recyclable raw resources. The goal of our work is the development of materials based on natural, waste fibres which would be a suitable ecological substitute for conventional insulations today. The production of these materials should have lower energy consumption and be without negative impact on the environment. The final products should possess at least comparable properties as found in insulations commonly used and should be affordable. However, given the different nature of the matrix of these fibrous materials, it is necessary to examine their hygrothermal behaviour in order to properly design placement of the material and ensure its optimal function. RESULTSThis paper describes the evaluation of properties of natural insulations with thermal conductivity in dry state between 0.0360 and 0.0443 W m(-1) K-1. The input raw materials were cotton, polyester, flax and textile fibres. The lowest thermal conductivity was found in mixture 2 consisting of 40% cotton, 40% PES, 20% BiCO fibres. CONCLUSIONIt can be concluded that thermal and acoustic insulation materials based on natural and recycled fibres are suitable for use in civil engineering. Their thermal-technical properties are similar to conventional insulations. (c) 2016 Society of Chemical Industry