Establishing patterns in the formation of biocomposites for thermal insulation of building structures

This study's object is the process that forms fire-resistant biocomposites based on wood chips and inorganic and organic binders. The task addressed relates to the need to enable resistance to high-temperature flames. This is important for the technology of application and production of environmentally friendly biocomposites obtained from natural and renewable sources for construction. It has been proven that when determining the thermal insulation properties of the resulting materials, the temperature conductivity of the biocomposite on an inorganic basis was 0.22·106 m2/s while the thermal conductivity of the sample did not exceed 0.132 W/(m∙K). In contrast, for an organic-based biocomposite, the thermal conductivity value decreases by more than 6 times, the temperature conductivity – by more than 7 times. In addition, the heat capacity of the product based on inorganic binder corresponds to a value within 1.6 kJ/(kg∙K), and the heat capacity value for the product made of biocomposite based on organic basis was 7.66 kJ/(kg∙K), respectively. When a radiation panel was applied to the biocomposite samples, the temperature of the gaseous combustion products increased to 96°C, and the sample did not ignite. A study of the compressive strength of biocomposites showed that the product formed on the basis of wood and inorganic binder is more fragile; the tensile strength corresponds to an average value of 0.5 MPa. In contrast, for the biocomposite formed on the basis of chips and organic binder, the average tensile strength is 2.4 MPa, which is more than 4.7 times higher than the product based on inorganic basis. The practical importance relates to the fact that the results were taken into account when developing a thermal insulation product for construction. Thus, there are grounds for the production of biocomposites for thermal insulation