TY  - JOUR
AU  - Tourtelot, Julia
AU  - Bourgès, Ann
AU  - Keita, Emmanuel
PY  - 2021
DA  - 2021/07/26
TI  - Influence of Biopolymers on the Mechanical Behavior of Earth-Based Building Materials
JO  - Recent Progress in Materials
SP  - 031
VL  - 03
IS  - 03
AB  - Currently, the largest among the earth excavation sites in Europe are located in the Paris region. The soils excavated from these sites are often considered waste and are not valorized. With an increasing focus on sustainable development, the demand for low-carbon building materials is rising. Although construction using raw earth is a vernacular technique, the diversity in the behavior of the raw earth building materials warrants better control of their mechanical properties. The construction techniques differ depending on the location of the site, the composition of the earth, and the stabilizers used. Plant-based fibers and compounds extracted from plants are commonly used for reinforcing raw earth. Since such byproduct solutions have been developed worldwide, they differ significantly, and it becomes difficult to set a benchmark. The majority of the reported studies have directly used organic waste, rendering it difficult to characterize the material and extend the obtained results to other contexts. In order to reduce these variabilities, it becomes important to study the reinforcement of earth-based building materials with biopolymers that constitute the active molecules of the bio-based solutions. In the present study, different biopolymers derived from various vernacular techniques were utilized to increase the compressive strength of the construction soil collected from the Paris region. It was revealed that cellulose fibers and wheat starch increased the compressive strength of the earth from 3.5 MPa to 5.5 MPa and 4.5 MPa, respectively. In addition, the interactions of these biopolymers with clay were analyzed. The biopolymers identified as suitable for use in construction materials in the present study are widely available as wastes from paper, agricultural, or agro-food industries. These identified biopolymers would contribute to the development and standardization of construction using earth-based building materials.
SN  - 2689-5846
UR  - https://doi.org/10.21926/rpm.2103031
DO  - 10.21926/rpm.2103031
ID  - Tourtelot2021
ER  -