A team from TKM College of Engineering has obtained patent for Plastile, a three-layered plastic tile with porous metal oxide core that can reduce thermal load on concrete roofs
While plastic menace continues unabated, TKM College of Engineering has developed a technology to transform the ubiquitous waste into something useful.
A four-member team from the college has obtained patent for Plastile, a three-layered plastic tile with porous metal oxide core that can reduce thermal load on concrete roofs. A product with high sustainability, the core and plastic layers can be separated and recycled any number of times as a raw material for Plastile. The product was designed and developed by a team that included three teachers P.G. Karthik, K.E. Reby Roy, Jesenna Muhammed, and PhD student J. Aravind.
Plastile has been designed in a way to exploit the properties of plastic and metal oxides in increasing the thermal resistance. The porous metal oxide core comes wrapped in plastic layers to maximise thermal resistance and the tiles can be fixed on roofs.
“Metals usually increase thermal conductivity but this particular design functions in a manner to reduce it. Unlike traditional tiled roofs, concrete roofs absorb heat and later release it. Plastile will provide effective thermal insulation bringing down room temperature in concrete buildings,” says Mr. Karthik.
All components that go into the production are waste materials. Metal oxide can be easily sourced from companies like Kerala Minerals and Metals Limited (KMML). Generated during the production of titanium dioxide, KMML has huge quantities of iron oxide slurry, a useless by-product. “Since the raw material cost is next to nothing, the production cost is also very low. The manufacturing process is also simple with minimal energy requirement,” they say.
Any plastic material can be used for the production and the granules are compressed in a particular pressure and temperature to make the sheets. “We have designed a special instrument for the process and it took us around four years to find the right composition and design the instrument. It is a commercially viable product and currently we are waiting for funding,” says Mr. Roy. He adds that recyclability is another highlight of the product.
“Usually we cannot reuse composite material, as it is difficult to separate plastic and iron. But in this particular design, we can reuse both components as raw material without any end cycle. There will be no wastage,” says Mr. Karthik.
