Controlling Thermal Flows through Natural Materials in Building Construction Sector

Abstract

Nowadays, the attention about the building sustainability is increasingly emerging, because of the major responsibility of the building field on the environmental degradation: both in terms of energy consumption from non-renewable sources and the raw materials impoverishment. In addition, the level of comfort required by users is growing and the thermal insulation of buildings becomes the key element for the reduction of energy consumption and CO2 emissions, both in the case of new construction and of the existing ones. The heat load of a building depends on the presence of insulating material which defines the performance of the building envelope. The main purpose of this work is both to introduce the production technology of a new ecofriendly Thermo-plaster and to evaluate its thermal insulation performances, also comparing amongst the most diffused insulation materials available in the market. This new technology, on the contrary of other competitor materials, is completely natural and doesn’t use any plastic matters. This new plaster is produced by using a mix of mortar, recycled and natural materials. Amongst the recycled ones we can recall the sawing mud and the glass, among the natural ones we used the Ampelodesmos Mauritanicus (also called diss), which is a perennial plant of the Gramineae family. Increasing the diss fibres percentage improves the thermal benefit. The Proposed plasters have shown thermal performances that can be considered satisfying and competitive compared to other commercially available plasters, analysed through the evaluation of the thermal and dynamics characteristics of four different possible stratigraphic configurations of vertical external walls.