Potential use of coconut fibre modified mortars to enhance thermal comfort in low-income housing

Edgar Quiñones-Bolaños; Marisol Gómez-Oviedo; Javier Mouthon-Bello; Liseth Sierra-Vitola; Umberto Berardi; Ciro Bustillo-Lecompte

doi:10.1016/j.jenvman.2020.111503

Potential use of coconut fibre modified mortars to enhance thermal comfort in low-income housing

J Environ Manage. 2021 Jan 1:277:111503. doi: 10.1016/j.jenvman.2020.111503. Epub 2020 Oct 19.

Authors

Edgar Quiñones-Bolaños¹, Marisol Gómez-Oviedo¹, Javier Mouthon-Bello¹, Liseth Sierra-Vitola², Umberto Berardi³, Ciro Bustillo-Lecompte⁴

Affiliations

¹ Environmental Modeling Research Group, Faculty of Engineering, University of Cartagena, Calle 30 # 48 -152, Cartagena, Colombia.
² Faculty of Economics, University of Cartagena, Calle 30 # 48 -152, Cartagena, Colombia.
³ Faculty of Engineering and Architectural Science, Ryerson University, 350 Victoria Street, Toronto, ON, M5B 2K3, Canada.
⁴ School of Occupational and Public Health, Ryerson University, 350 Victoria Street, Toronto, ON, M5B 2K3, Canada. Electronic address: ciro.lecompte@ryerson.ca.

PMID: 33091786
DOI: 10.1016/j.jenvman.2020.111503

Abstract

Enhancing the thermal comfort of low-income housing in developing countries located in tropical areas is one of the main challenges for engineers and architects worldwide. The coconut mesocarp fibre (coir) has shown enormous potential for improving some properties of modified concretes or mortars, such as low-weight and high-acoustic isolation. In this study, the potential use of modified mortars by coconut fibres as a facade coating layer to enhance thermal comfort in low-income housing structures was evaluated for the city of Cartagena de Indias, Colombia. An actual typical low-income house of 42 m² was monitored. Temperature and humidity variations were monitored for 39 days, thermal characteristics of coir-modified mortars were also investigated using differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and an adaptation of the standard test method of the guarded-hot-cartridge apparatus. The EnergyPlus™ software was used to simulate indoor temperature variations in the studied house. Results show that during the period of 4 h of maximum sunlight radiation with outdoor temperatures in the range of 29-34 °C, coating the cement-sand hollow block structure with a layer of coir-modified mortar could reduce indoor room temperatures by 0.5-1.5 °C, approximately. Thus, there is a potential to enhance the thermal comfort in low-income housing structures with coconut fibre modified mortars while reducing annual energy costs of cooling by 16%, making it affordable for low-income families in the Caribbean region of Colombia.

Keywords: Material recycling; Natural fibres; Thermal comfort; Waste minimization.

MeSH terms

Caribbean Region
Cities
Cocos*
Colombia
Housing*