Thermal and optical characterization of natural and artificial marble for roof and external floor installations

Some types of buildings need to use certain materials for aesthetic reasons, like churches or mosques. Marble is one of the most common materials usually installed on roofs and floors. The measurement of the thermal and optical characteristics can be useful to understand its behaviour when it is subjected to thermal loads such as solar radiation or high temperature winds. The paper shows a comparison study between natural and artificial types of marble, to investigate the thermal characteristics both in steady-state and transient conditions. Optical properties and surface emissivity were evaluated, in order to calculate the Solar Reflectance Index (SRI); the specific heat, the thermal conductivity and the density were measured to define the thermophysical properties useful for the dynamic analysis. Finally, a test bench was created to check the marble behaviour under known artificial irradiation.