Lightweight clay bricks manufactured by using locally available wine industry waste

Lightweight bricks with reduced thermal conductivity and acceptable physical-mechanical properties have become an important trend for green buildings to reduce the building weight and the energy consumption. In this work lightweight bricks were manufactured from wine wastes (stalks, grape seeds, and wine less) by controlling the nature and concentration of those additives. The wine wastes WWs, completely characterized before their use in the matrix, were furnished by a cooperative wine-growers associations located in the Emilia-Romagna Region (Italy). Physico-mechanical properties of fired clay bricks manufactured with different percentages of WWs are reported and discussed. The results showed that the density of fired bricks was reduced up to 13%, depending on the percentage of WWs incorporated into the raw materials. Similarly, the flexural strength of tested bricks decreased according to the percentage of WWs included in the mixture. The best results, in terms of mechanical and physical properties, were obtained with 5 % wt. of wine less (WL). The results showed as the lightness of these samples is associated to the porosity increase that directly influences the increase of the thermal insulation making the bricks useable for partitioning walls application.