LESTER LAZO

MSCE-SE

Development of New Construction Materials for Thermal Insulation of Building Base

on Aggregates of Waste Paper and Cement

Introduction
Building accounts for between 16% and 23% of the total plastic use, making it the
second largest sector. Furthermore, this industry accounts for between 30% and 40% of
global energy consumption and produces around 33% of greenhouse gas emissions
connected to energy use worldwide (Lopez Hurtado et al., 2016; Kumar et al., 2020; Pal
et al., 2021; Zhao et al., 2022). The majority of traditional insulating materials used in
construction come from petrochemical sources (Carlos Javier et al., 2023). Building
material production and manufacturing have a greater carbon footprint and pollute the
air, land, and water (Maraveas, 2020). Construction materials derived from agro-
industrial waste are increasingly attractive in the construction sector, due to their
sustainability and lower environmental impact. Hence, in recent years the amount of
research and publications tending to the development of materials that take advantage
of residues from agro-industrial activities has increased (Chabannes et al., 2014; Viegas
et al., 2014; Lopez Hurtado et al., 2016; Liu et al., 2017; Antunes et al., 2019; Dixit and
Yadav, 2019; Muthuraj et al., 2019; Maraveas, 2020; Moreno et al., 2021; Nandy et al.,
2021; Zou et al., 2021; Ali et al., 2022; Amantino et al., 2022; Carlos Javier et al., 2023),
to reduce the environmental impact generated by commercial materials such as
fiberglass, rock wool, expanded polystyrene, polyurethane foam, polystyrene, phenolics,
among other non-biodegradable materials. Thus, in the scientific literature studies have
been reported with insulating materials based on cane fibers, coconut tow, cassava,
rice, wood, coffee husks, cork, sheep’s wool, recycled newsprint, textile fibers, trays egg,
and others.
Because of its thermoacoustic qualities, cellulose—which is made from recycled
and shredded newspaper—is the most commonly used thermal insulator. The primary
source of cellulose fiber is the physical separation of newsprint, which is subsequently
processed and shred (Lopez Hurtado et al., 2016; Garzón Bernal and Cuba Córdoba,
2020). Cellulose insulation can be applied manually or with specialized equipment to
walls, ceilings, and attics. It can also be purchased as pre-cast panels, in which cellulose
fibers are molded with polyester or a comparable binder. Although cellulose fiber was
first used as an insulating material in 1919 in Canada, commercial products were not
developed in the US until 1950. The US oil embargo in the 1970s contributed to the rise
in popularity of pulp application (Lopez Hurtado et al., 2016).
LESTER LAZO
MSCE-SE

Between 30% and 40% of energy consumption worldwide is attributed to the

construction industry (Lopez Hurtado et al., 2016; Das and Tiwari, 2018; Carlos Javier et
al., 2023). From the perspective of heat transfer, all building materials (particularly their
thicknesses and thermal conductivity coefficients) as well as indoor and outdoor
temperatures must be taken into account when designing or conditioning a building. On
the other hand, about 20% of the total energy consumption in buildings worldwide
corresponds to the use of air conditioners (Hu et al., 2019; Bienvenido-Huertas et al.,
2020). In this case, the role of thermal insultation materials in the building envelope is
significant, especially in hot-humid region. The envelope is recognized as a key part for
enhancing their thermal efficiency since it expends between 50% and 60% of the whole
heat transfer (Kumar et al., 2020; Zhao et al., 2022).
According to the reviewed research, to establish sustainable houses and buildings
or “green buildings and neighborhoods” (Zhang et al., 2019), as strategies to reduce
energy consumption, it is necessary to verify the possibility of implementing new
insulating materials, lighting changes and the implementation of systems that include
renewable energy, prior to a more detailed feasibility study.
This work presents the methodology used to develop an alternative insulation
material based on newspaper (cellulose) as a contribution to the creation of new
materials from waste materials. Testing was done both mechanically and thermally.
Furthermore, the results should serve as a foundation for further study into the use of
agro-industrial waste as a substitute for conventional building materials in the
development of environmentally friendly structures.

Justification of the Project

Although paper has long been used in construction as a material, it can be used
as a structural material. For example, it can be processed into paper tubes for use as
building beams and columns, or it can be processed into cardboard as a building
maintenance structure; it can also be used as a maintenance structure. However, due to
the strength requirements of these materials in building, recycled paper is rarely used in
these applications. The actual use of recycled paper that can be commercialized is to use
it as cellulose insulation.
Additionally, turning recycled paper into cellulose is a more environmentally
beneficial process than standard recycling methods. This is due to the fact that
producing new paper and recycling old paper both require significant energy, chemical,
and emission consumption. On the other hand, the paper can be easily recycled into
LESTER LAZO
MSCE-SE

cellulose insulating material, which requires minimal chemical treatment and rapid
shredding.

Objective of the research

The purpose of this research study aims to develop a new construction material
as a thermal insulation of building with the use of recycled paper, binder and aggregate.
It deals of picking up or gathering all waste of papers and outdates newspapers and
transforming them into brick for building constructions which papers have prominent
thermal insulating properties. In addition to seeking the favor of the environment,
mitigating pollution, it is intended to verify that the recycled materials can generate an
economic benefit that it is resistant and durable and that it can contribute greatly to
populations with little state investment in infrastructure and equipment, specifically on
matters of improvement of building structure.

Conceptual Paradigm

CREATE SAMPLES
OBTAIN COLLECT REQUIRED FROM THE LABORATORY TEST
INFORMATION MATERIALS COLLECTED OF SAMPLES
MATERIALS

Methodology
The research proposal is a descriptive and experimental with a quantitative
approach. It will be divided into three phases such as First phase wherein information
will be collected by the researcher from books, documents, previous research, online
source and etc. in which the data collected must be related to the objective of the
research. The Second phase will be the collection of the materials such as collection of
waste paper to produce new construction materials. Once the samples were produced,
the process will now proceed to the Final Phase in which the samples will be subjected
to laboratory test.
The whole of manufacturing process is totally artisanal. The basic elements are
waste paper, cement, sand and water.
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MSCE-SE

 Implementation
The principle consists in mixing the sand, cement and the paper waste into pulp
(powder) to dry before gradually pouring water in order to have a material as
homogeneous as possible. The binder-paper assembly is then kneaded. Since the
powder is very soft and easy to disintegrate with the addition of the excess water, ten
minutes is sufficient to obtain a good homogeneity of the mixture. This greatly reduces
energy consumption.
 Drying
From the design point of view, knowledge of the drying time is crucial to achieve
better performance. In the following, a cylindrical specimen is made according to the
following notation convention: paper-cement-sand-water 3-1-1-2 represents three
quantities of paper, an amount of cement, an amount of sand and a quantity of water
(eg 3 kg of paper pulp, 1 kg of cement, 1 kg of sand and 2 liters of water, which is in
particular 2 kg). Thus, measurements were made for two types of test pieces, 3-1-1-2
and 2-1-1-2. Samples weighed in a regular interval of 12 hours.

Fig. 1. Weight of the test piece in relation to the drying time

The weight of the 2-1-1 specimen is stable after about 150 hours, ie one week
after molding. That of 3-1-1 asks for cons about 9 days to have a stable weight.
 Product features
Density : By way of comparison, we show in the following table the densities of
paper + binder, concrete and earth brick.
LESTER LAZO
MSCE-SE

For Final phase, the samples will now subject for several laboratory test such:
1. Compression test
2. Fire Resistance
3. Water absorption test
Compression test will identify if the compression stress of the samples and also
to identify if the materials will brittle when subjected to a load. Fire resistant to
measure of the thermal endurance of the samples and to identify the ability of the
samples to retain its shape up to a specified temperature under specified load or to
deform only within specific limit at a specified test temperature. The water
absorption test on the other hand will test the samples to determine the amount of
water absorbed under specific condition.

REFERENCES
 Online source
 B. Mandili et al., Experimental study of a new ecological building material for a
thermal insulation based on waste paper and lime, Journal on Construction and
Building Materials, Volume 228, 2019
 Tefy Raoelivololona et al., Paper recycling for the making of constructions
materials, MATEC Web of Conferences 307, 01041 (2020)
 Science Direct
 Zeyu Wang et al., Can Paper Waste Be Utilised as an Insulation Material in
Response to the Current Crisis, Journal on MDPI, 2023
 Nacarí Marín-Calvo et al., Thermal insulation material produced from recycled
materials for building applications: cellulose and rice husk-based material,
Sustainable Design and Construction, Volume 09, 2023