ALTERNATIVE BUILDING MATERIAL - WOOD WASTE FIBRE GYPSUM PLASTER

Abstract

With the overarching idea of building a cleaner greener world, many initiatives and green movements have been mooted to ensure the sustainability in today’s society. The concept of the 3Rs—Reduce, Reuse and Recycle, is key to this green transformation the world is undergoing. Reusing wood waste fibres is the focus of this project, to find an alternative usage for these fibres. Through literature reviews, site visits and interviews, the idea of incorporating wood waste fibres into gypsum plaster was suggested. The fibres were thought to have a positive effect on improving the performance of the traditional pure gypsum plaster since it would provide a substrate for the gypsum to clump together, thus strengthening its overall cohesiveness. The widespread usage of gypsum plaster within the built industry would also provide the opportunity for the wood waste fibres to be utilised on a large scale, an attempt to markedly improve the standards of the plastering element. Experiments were then conducted to compare the new plaster with the traditional plaster as a form of benchmark test, in accordance to present plaster standards. The results of the tests proved the comparable performance in most aspects for both types of plasters with the wood waste fibre gypsum plaster faring better in terms of compressive strength but worse in mass loss percentage. A more in depth study for testing acoustical properties would further enhance the understanding of this new plaster, to ascertain its value add of a new eco-friendly plaster introduced into the construction industry.