Thermal Characterization of Concrete and Cement Mortar from Construction Sites and Industrial Production Units in the City of Ouagadougou with a View to Standardization in Energy Certification

The present study allowed to carry out a thermal characterization of concrete and cement mortar. Thermal tests were carried out with the KD2 Pro device, on concrete and mortar samples taken from twenty-six (26) construction sites of office buildings and two (2) industrial production units in the city of Ouagadougou. The tests were carried out on rectangular specimens after four weeks (4) of conservation on the site of construction or production of materials. This study seeks to determine the thermal properties of the materials, in particular the thermal conductivity, the thermal diffusivity and the thermal capacity of the samples, in the real conditions of execution of the buildings and environment. The thermal conductivity varies from 1.413 to 1.965 W/m·K, 0.940 - 1.658 W/m·K and 0.703 - 1.149 W/m·K respectively for concrete, cinder block mortar and plaster mortar. Regarding the other properties, especially the capacity and thermal diffusivity, the values vary respectively, from 1070.59 - 1974.67 kJ/kg·K and (3.74 - 6.70) × 10-7 m2/s for concrete, from 1123.69 - 1586.81 kJ/kg·K and (3.38 - 5.65) × 10-7 m2/s for plaster mortar and 1202.51 - 1736.01 kJ/kg·K and (3.82 - 7.36) × 10-7 m2/s for the mortar of building blocks. The conductivity, capacity and thermal diffusivity of industrial mortar vary from 1.019 - 1.229 W/m·K, 792.18 - 1862.58 J/kg·K and (2.75 - 6.80) × 10-7 m2/s, respectively. Only the correlations made between the thermal properties and the density of the samples of the plaster mortar, give good relations namely R2 = 0.9308 for the thermal conductivity, R2 = 0.7823 for the thermal capacity and R2 = 0.9272 for the thermal diffusivity. This study contributes to the establishment of a thermal regulation in Burkina Faso for the adoption of the West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU) Directive 05 on energy efficiency in buildings.

Study of the Potential for the Solar Concentrating Sector in Burkina Faso

The results of atmospheric effect characterization on the town of Ouagadougou in Burkina Faso are presented and the link with the availability of the direct component of solar radiation is discussed.Experimental meteorological data are treated to set a system of constant references which are used to extrapolate the likely atmospheric effect given by the other experimental meteorological data from 1976 to 2006.As results the periods of strong monthly attenuation of the solar potential are pointed out.