Characteristics of Agro Waste Fibers as New Thermal Insulation and Sound Absorbing Materials: Hybrid of Date Palm Tree Leaves and Wheat Straw Fibers

ABSTRACT

New novel biodegradable natural thermal insulation materials are manufactured from agro-waste materials such as date palm tree leaves and wheat straw fibers as a potential use in buildings’ insulation. Ten fiberboards are prepared, where three of them are loose leaves and the remaining are bound boards. These bound boards can be classified as either single fibers or hybrid. Cornstarch and wood adhesive are used as binders for the fibers. The Thermal conductivity are measured for all fiberboards and found to be in the range 0.045–0.065 W/m K at temperatures 10–60°C, respectively. The Sound absorption coefficient is greater than 0.6 for frequencies greater than 900 Hz for almost all boards, which indicates a very good sound absorption behavior for these hybrid materials. Date palm tree leaves are found to be thermally stable up to about 213°C. Three-point bending tests are also conducted for the hybrid bound boards. The results indicate the potential use of such novel bound fiberboards and their new hybrid ones as new natural materials for thermal insulation and sound absorbing.

摘要

新型可生物降解天然保温材料是以农业废弃物枣棕叶和麦秸纤维为主要原料制备的一种新型建筑保温材料. 准备了十块纤维板，其中三块为活页，其余为装订板. 这些粘合板可分为单纤维或混合纤维. 玉米淀粉和木材粘合剂用作纤维的粘合剂. 测量了所有纤维板的热导率，发现在10-60℃温度下，热导率分别在0.045-0.065 W/m K范围内. 对于几乎所有的板，当频率大于900hz时，吸声系数大于0.6，这表明这些混合材料具有非常好的吸声性能. 人们发现，椰枣树叶的热稳定性高达213摄氏度左右. 并对复合板进行了三点弯曲试验. 结果表明，这种新型粘结纤维板及其新型混杂纤维板作为新型天然隔热吸声材料具有潜在的应用前景.

KEYWORDS-:

• Date palm leaves
• wheat straw fibers
• thermal conductivity measurements
• hybrid date palm leaves/wheat straw fibers
• thermogravimetric analysis
• acoustic analysis

关键词:

• 关键词
• 椰枣叶
• 麦草纤维
• 热导率测量
• 杂交椰枣叶/麦秸纤维
• 热重分析
• 声学分析

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Mr. Al-turki, Al-Ajlan, Al-Mosabi, and Al-Sulaimi for preparing the boards and taken some thermal conductivity measurements.

Disclosure statement

The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest

Additional information

Funding

The authors would like to extend their sincere appreciation to the Deanship of Scientific Research at King Saud University for funding this work through the Research Group Project No. (RGP-080).