ABSTRACT
Stepping up the extraction of valuable resources from the oil palm agro-industry was fraught with palm kernel shell (PKS) disposal challenges. One mitigating measure was to recover these materials for use in fired brick production. So PKS and clay materials were characterized for their physical, mineral and thermal properties. These characterizations revealed the high content of SiO2 and Al2O3 in the clay resources and the 95.60% organic content of PKS along with its estimated 21, 774.94 (kJ/kg) higher heating value (HHV). Indexed minerals from X-ray diffraction (XRD) studies of the clay material were kaolinite, quartz, calcite and goethite. Bricks prepared with the inclusion of up to 16 wt% PKS were fired at 900 and 1000 °C. For bricks fired at 1000 °C, bulk densities decreased from 2.07 to 1.54 g/cm3, apparent porosity increased up to 89.14%, water absorption increased from 100% in reference bricks to 203.54% with the addition of 16 wt% PKS. While compressive strengths decreases were in the range of 21.67–6.07 MPa, thermal insulation improved by 22%. Similar trends were established for bricks fired at 900 °C. The analyses showed that PKS addition was more effective in tailoring the technical properties of the bricks than changes in firing temperature. The marginal differences in technical properties of bricks fired at 1000 °C relative to the 900 °C fired brick units were understood from scanning electron microscopy (SEM) studies. Therefore, this research has provided compelling evidences for use of PKS in fired brick production. © 2023 Elsevier Ltd