Glass foams from dismantled cathode ray tubes

Glasses from dismantled cathode ray tubes (CRTs) represent a pressing environmental problem, since their direct reutilization in manufacturing the original glass components is very difficult. The most hardly recycled glass, panel glass, has been employed for the manufacturing of glass foams, intended for thermal and acoustic insulation, by sintering of a mixture of glass and calcium carbonate powder mixture. In this work, we illustrate the effects of the heating rate, the holding time and the concentration of carbonate, employed as foaming agent, in the same sintering process, on the relation between density and crushing strength. Due to the observed mechanical properties and the results of preliminary thermal conductivity tests the obtained materials were found to approach commercial glass foams.