Incorporation of titanium dioxide nanoparticles in mortars – influence of microstructure in the hardened state properties and photocatalytic activity

The environmental pollution in urban areas is one of the causes for poor indoor air quality in buildings, particularly in suburban areas. The development of photocatalytic construction materials can contribute to clean the air and improve sustainability levels. Previous studies have focused mainly in cement and concrete materials, disregarding the potential application in historic buildings. In this work, a photocatalytic additive (titanium dioxide) was added to mortars prepared with aerial lime, cement and gypsum binders. The main goal was to study the way that microstructural changes affect the photocatalytic efficiency. The photocatalytic activity was determined using a reactor developed to assess the degradation rate with a common urban pollutant, NOx. The laboratory results show that all the compositions tested exhibited high photocatalytic efficiency. It was demonstrated that photocatalytic mortars can be applied in new and old buildings, because the nanoadditives do not compromise the mortar hardened state properties.The authors acknowledge the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) for the financial support (PTDC/ECM/72104/2006)