Abstract
A new flexible thermal insulation sheet, a composite of silica aerogel with polypropylene (PP) foam, has been developed. Even though a large volume ratio of silica aerogel (97%) was included, the composite showed high flexibility. Thermal conductivity of the composite was 0.016 W/(m⋅K) at 298 K, which is as low as silica aerogel monolith. Silica aerogel flaking, which has been a problem in practical applications, is very low in this composite due to skin layers of the polymer-foam composite. A supercritical drying process for rolled sheets of the material for large-scale production is also described. Simulations of extraction of 2-propanol from a silica alcogel revealed that rolled composite sheets with small spaces between the sheet composite are able to dry in a reasonable extraction time. These findings led to effective on production of this material on a pilot industrial scale.
Highlights
Over the past several years, there has been significant interest in discovering new thermal insulating materials for a variety of applications
We have developed a new, highly flexible, high performance thermal insulation material with a low degree of silica aerogel flaking
We previously reported the development of combinations of silica aerogels and various polymer foams including polyurethane, melamine, and polypropylene (PP)
Summary
Over the past several years, there has been significant interest in discovering new thermal insulating materials for a variety of applications. Inorganic (glass, silica, alumina and other oxides, carbon) and organic (natural and artificial polymers) fibers have been employed as reinforcement materials (Linhares et al, 2019) Composites with nanofibers such as cellulose (Cai et al, 2012) and polyvinylidene fluoride (Wu et al, 2013) demonstrated very high flexibility. We have developed a new, highly flexible, high performance thermal insulation material with a low degree of silica aerogel flaking. We previously reported the development of combinations of silica aerogels and various polymer foams including polyurethane, melamine, and polypropylene (PP). These compounds show thermal conductivity as low as silica aerogel monolith (Yoda and Furuya, 2012). 20 × 20 mm) and placed in stacks of a few sheets of approximately the same thickness (10 and 5 mm), and the solgel process was conducted after they were immersed in the silica sol
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