Expanded Inorganic Insulating Materials: Production, Characteristics and Application Areas.

Perhaps Inorganic expanded insulating materials are usually underestimated, although they always demonstrate that, loose or mixed with concrete, they can give good thermal insulation, good mechanical resistance and can be a safe fire-protection solution. For the most widely employed of them in the Italian construction industry, this paper describes the origins, the production processes and the applications; the report is devided into loose insulating materials and concretes. The Italian rules and codes are mentioned taking into account also the fire-safety problems and describing the fire-performances of these insulating materials.