Hourly thermal analysis of innovative concrete bricks using sawdust and phase change material

ABSTRACT Thermal insulators and energy storage materials have shown progressive thermal performance when integrated with construction materials. However, integrating both of them may result in better enhancements in extreme hot locations, utilising their ability to resist excess heat. In this research, concrete bricks were fabricated by involving sawdust (SD) and phase change material (PCM) into plastic containers and tested under severe hot conditions for a full thermal cycle. Three concrete bricks integrated with SD, PCM, and PCM/SD were developed and examined against a fourth brick that involved empty containers as a reference. The thermal behaviour and energy contribution of the developed bricks were assessed considering the temperature shrinkage between the outer and inner surface temperatures and time lagging. Results displayed that the PCM brick was dominant over other bricks, showing a maximum temperature shrinking of 7.25°C, with a time lag of over 4 hours. Compared to the reference brick, the PCM brick has reduced and lagged the inner surface temperature by about 3°C and 70 min, respectively. However, the PCM/SD brick also indicated better thermal performance than the SD brick, indicating superiority of thermal energy storage over thermal insulation to develop high-performance buildings.