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Washington State University researchers have developed an environmentally-friendly, plant-based material that for the first time works better than Styrofoam for insulation.
The foam is mostly made from nanocrystals of cellulose, the most abundant plant material on earth. The researchers also developed an environmentally friendly and simple manufacturing process to make the foam, using water as a solvent instead of other harmful solvents.
The work, led by Amir Ameli, assistant professor in the School of Mechanical and Materials Engineering, and Xiao Zhang, associate professor in the Gene and Linda School of Chemical Engineering and Bioengineering, is published in the journal Carbohydrate Polymers.
[...]The material that they created contains a uniform cellular structure that means it is a good insulator. For the first time, the researchers report, the plant-based material surpassed the insulation capabilities of Styrofoam. It is also very lightweight and can support up to 200 times its weight without changing shape. It degrades well, and burning it doesn’t produce polluting ash.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 24 2019, @07:08AM (4 children)
How well? I do not want to replace the insulation in the wall every year. I also don't want mice eating it all up. Being a plant based carbohydrate, I bet it would be fairly tasty to rodents.
(Score: 2) by KritonK on Friday May 24 2019, @07:26AM (2 children)
Given that this is a form of cellulose, another form of which is wood, I would think that it degrades the same as wood, which, properly maintained, may last for centuries, but is vulnerable to rot, mold, and termites.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by bradley13 on Friday May 24 2019, @09:05AM (1 child)
Inside a house, it is normally too dry for insects and fungus to be a problem. However, insulation will be subject to damp. Dunno if bugs like to eat cellulose, but fungus certainly will.
There are various forms of cellulose insulation [greenbuildingadvisor.com] on the market, so this isn't an unknown problem. Other forms of cellulose insulation are treated with borates [orst.edu] to fend off fungus and insects. Presumably this styrofoam replacement would be as well. Borates are apparently considered to be quite safe for humans.
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Friday May 24 2019, @04:01PM
I don't think borates are particularly safe for humans, though boric acid has been used as an eye-wash. But they don't usually tend to be volatile, and they aren't especially poisonous. (That said, that's too much of a generalization, as the compound is often quite different from the element.) https://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/phs/phs.asp?id=451&tid=80 [cdc.gov]
And excess boron doesn't accumulate in the body, so a small exposure isn't a problem.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Friday May 24 2019, @08:06AM
Doesn't have to be particularly tasty for rodents [etymonline.com] to want/need to gnaw on them.