Hygrothermal performance of diatomite-based humidity control building material

Diatomite-Based Humidity Control Building Material (DBHCBM) has been prepared. Surface pore structures and pore distributions of the 3 kinds of DBHCBM are characterized by micrograph and statistical analysis method. An experimental apparatus has been established to measure humidity control performance of the 3 kinds of DBHCBM at different levels of ambient temperature and ambient Relative Humidity (RH) according to saturated solution method. The experimental results show that the adsorption content of DBHCBM is always more than the desorption content of DBHCBM, the time when adsorption approaching a stable state is always greater than that when desorption reaching a stable state. DBHCBM is more sensitive to variations in ambient RH than in ambient temperature. Better humidity control performance of DBHCBM demands for smaller porosity, tinier pore size and more tiny pores, which provides the experimental foundations for preparing high performance humidity control materials.