Скачать или смотреть DATE PALM SURFACE FIBERS AS A GREEN THERMAL INSULATOR

B. Abu-Jdayil
Chemical and Petroleum Eng. Dept., UAE University, UAE

High performance thermal insulation in the building structures is necessary for energy efficiency. The installation of thermal insulation becomes more cost effective and environmentally friendly when insulations are made from renewable materials. Here, high performance green insulation material using date palm surface fibers were prepared in simple process without utilizing any toxic materials. Polyvinyl alcohol has been used as a binding material to prepare four insulation samples with different densities. The fabricated green insulators showed promising thermal insulation properties with thermal conductivity and thermal diffusivity values in a range of 0.038-0.051 W/(m.K) and 0.137-0.147 mm2/s, respectively. Thermogravimetric analysis showed that the insulating sample has high thermal stability with a very high initial degradation temperature between 260-280 ºC where it losses only 10 wt.% of its original weight. Differential scanning calorimetry analysis showed a very high melting point value of 225 ºC for insulating sample which closely corresponds to the binder melting point. FT-IR analysis confirmed that the fiber-based insulation material retains its organic nature. The insulation material has a reasonable ultimate tensile range of 6.9-10 MPa. Results of this work show that development of insulation materials from lignocellulosic waste materials is a promising strategy to develop green and cheap substitutes for petroleum-based high cost and toxic insulation materials.