Recent developments in biomass derived cellulose aerogel materials for thermal insulation application: a review

Thermal insulation of a building plays an important role to reduce energy consumption for maintaining an optimal atmosphere inside the building. Hence, it is crucial to improve the thermal insulation property of the building sector, in particular by enabling energy savings through the reduction of energy losses for heating–cooling purposes. It is well known that a good quality of thermally insulating material generally depends on several important parameters- low thermal conductivity, renewability, cost-effectiveness and environment friendly resources, etc. In this context, biomass derived cellulose aerogel can be an attractive material, which can fulfil these parameters as compared to other conventional insulating materials. Cellulose aerogels have many superior physical and chemical characteristics such as high surface area and low thermal conductivity. For these reasons, they can be used as an efficient thermal insulating material for energy saving purposes in the building sector. Interestingly, cellulose has the advantage of bearing different hydroxyl groups, which can be easily modified by fillers, like inorganic materials through non covalent interactions which makes them mechanically and thermally stable for better performance as a thermal insulator. Considering the above advantages of using cellulose, in this review we have discussed the development of cellulose based thermal insulating materials and their scope for commercialization toward real-life applications. Furthermore, this study can stimulate the research and application of cellulose based thermal insulators to achieve renewable and cost-effective insulating materials in the near future. Graphical abstract