At this year's World Expo, the Italian Pavilion used a new kind of "transparent cement", which made it possible for natural light to illuminate more people and saved the lighting power inside the building.
Italy Pavilion covers an area of 3,600 square meters and is18m high. A lot of new technologies are adopted, and the whole pavilion building is imagined as a "machine" with the function of ecological climate regulation. 3774 transparent precast slabs made of 189 tons of "transparent cement" cover 40% of the surface of the Italian Pavilion. This is also the first industrial application solution of "transparent cement".
This new product, developed by Bergamo Laboratory, ensures transparency through innovative design of mixed cement and mixture. The good fluidity of the mixture makes the plastic resin structure combine with the solid cement precast slab. Light can penetrate from the inside out. If cement material is properly inserted, the experiment proves that resin has stronger transparency and lower cost than optical fiber, and can be used on a large scale. In addition, because the viewing angle of resin is wider than that of optical fiber, it has a stronger ability to "capture" light, which actually enhances the transparency and lighting effect of building materials.
According to Mauricio Futai, the chief representative of the Shanghai office of the Italian Foreign Trade Commission, light-transmitting cement is made by mixing resin and cement in proportion through patented technology, and the maximum light transmittance can reach 20%. Futai introduced that transparent cement was developed by Italian Cement Group at the request and creativity of Italian pavilion designer Jim Paul. This World Expo is the first large-scale public application of this technology. After the World Expo, transparent cement may be put into mass production and become another great invention brought to the world by the World Expo.