A Comparative Study on Opto-Thermal Properties of Natural Clay Bricks Incorporating Dredged Sediments

Mattia Manni, Fabiana Frota de Albuquerque Landi, Tommaso Giannoni, Alessandro Petrozzi, Andrea Nicolini and Franco Cotana
Additional contact information
Mattia Manni: Sustainable Heritage Conservation Centre, University for Foreigners of Perugia, 06125 Perugia, Italy
Fabiana Frota de Albuquerque Landi: CIRIAF—Interuniversity Research Center on Pollution and Environment “Mauro Felli”, Department of Engineering, University of Perugia, 06125 Perugia, Italy
Tommaso Giannoni: CIRIAF—Interuniversity Research Center on Pollution and Environment “Mauro Felli”, Department of Engineering, University of Perugia, 06125 Perugia, Italy
Alessandro Petrozzi: CIRIAF—Interuniversity Research Center on Pollution and Environment “Mauro Felli”, Department of Engineering, University of Perugia, 06125 Perugia, Italy
Andrea Nicolini: CIRIAF—Interuniversity Research Center on Pollution and Environment “Mauro Felli”, Department of Engineering, University of Perugia, 06125 Perugia, Italy
Franco Cotana: CIRIAF—Interuniversity Research Center on Pollution and Environment “Mauro Felli”, Department of Engineering, University of Perugia, 06125 Perugia, Italy

Energies, 2021, vol. 14, issue 15, 1-17

Abstract: The brick industry is currently facing a shortage of natural resources. Despite this, the demand for construction bricks is progressively increasing. Alternative materials, such as dredged sediments and solid organic waste, have been recently proposed as options to replace natural clay in brick manufacturing. Potential exploitation of dredged sediments in clay bricks is evaluated in this study. The chemical composition of the mixtures and the opto-thermal properties of brick samples, which differed for the dredged sediment content (from 10% to 50% of the clay weight), were investigated. Chemical analyses detected lower concentrations of heavy metals in bricks incorporating dredged sediments (DS). Negligible variations in thermal conductivity, thermal diffusivity, and specific heat were observed by increasing the amount of DS in the mixture. In particular, the thermal conductivity values ranged between 0.45 ± 0.03 W m −1 K −1 (DS-50) and 0.50 ± 0.03 W m −1 K −1 (DS-30). Conversely, the color shift value and spectral reflectance in the infrared field were found directly proportional to the concentration of DS. Using dredged sediments as building material demonstrated to be a solution to the problem of their disposal and the scarcity of raw materials, reducing the global warming score by up to 2.8%.

Keywords: clay brick; life-cycle assessment; waste management; sustainability (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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