Improving Thermal Resistance of Walling Material Using AAC Residue

Abstract

General components of building envelope are bricks, blocks, concrete etc. Thermal conductivity property of these materials play a major role in the total energy demand of a building. For the same, the present paper is an effort to lower thermal conductivity of bricks through its surface treatment. Bricks used for the surface treatment were in accordance with IS 1077 (BIS, 1992). For the surface treatment of the bricks, autoclaved aerated concrete (AAC) block waste was identified and collected from local industry. Collected AAC block waste was then converted into powder and used for the surface treatment of the bricks. CFBA bricks without surface treatment and with surface treatment were checked for its thermal conductivity. Thermal conductivity of the CFBA bricks with surface treatment was reduced by 7.5% in comparison with the CFBA bricks without any surface treatment. Whereas, the reduction in the thermal conductivity of the surface treated CFBA bricks was 64% in comparison with commercially available fly ash (FA) bricks. Due to the reduced thermal conductivity of the surface treated CFBA bricks, operational energy demand required to maintain a comfortable temperature (18-27°C) within the surface treated CFBA building model house was decreased by 30% in comparison with FA brick model house.

Keywords: AAC, walling material, energy, cooling load