Thermal characterisation and fire performance of phase change material incorporated plasterboards

Phase Change Material (PCM) incorporated plasterboards (referred to as PCM-plasterboards in this paper) have been introduced to the lightweight wall construction industry due to their high thermal storage capacity, which improves the thermal performance. However, the fire performance of these wall systems must be investigated to ensure the safety of building structures in fire. The fire performance of lightweight wall systems mainly depends on the wall lining. Hence, the fire performance of PCM-plasterboard has been investigated using thermal characterisation, small-scale fire tests and Finite Element (FE) analyses in this research. This paper describes the details of this research and presents the results of PCM-plasterboards in comparison with commonly used, standard gypsum plasterboards. The thermal characteristics of PCM-plasterboard and standard gypsum plasterboard at elevated temperatures were determined based on thermal property tests whereas small-scale standard fire tests of the boards were conducted to evaluate the fire performance based on time-temperature profiles. FE models were then developed and analysed to simulate the performance of these boards exposed to standard fire conditions. Results from both experimental and FE studies show that lower Fire Resistance Levels (FRL) were obtained for PCM-plasterboards compared to gypsum plasterboards while importantly, PCM-plasterboard provided additional fuel to the fire.