Improvement of Compressed Earth Brick Properties by Stabilization with Combined Cement and Rice Fibers

In the present article, the effect of combined rice biomass and cement stabilization on the mechanical and thermal properties of compressed earth blocs are analyzed. The considered stabilizers are rice straw, rice husk and cement. A previews study highlighted the effect of the individual stabilizer on both mechanical and thermal properties was determined. In fact, it was shown that cement stabilization highly increases the mechanical properties but it has negative impact on the insulation performance of the bloc. In the other hand, the rice fibers (straw and husk) improve both the insulation performance and the mechanical properties but the increase in mechanical properties is not significant with respect to that observed with cement. Then, in this study, we analyze the impact of combining rice fibers and cement as stabilizers in the compressed bricks. The results show that the combination of rice fibers and cement in some proportions allows to significantly improve both mechanical properties and insulation performance of the soil bricks.