"Frozen Smoke" Insulation Could Get a Lot Cheaper

Dr. Halimaton Hamdan from the Universiti Teknologi in Malaysia has developed a method of producing aerogel that could reduce the cost of producing this material by 80% by using agricultural waste from rice husks as the feedstock. Rice husks evidently have a high silica content, and silica is the main constituent of aerogel. In addition to potentially being able to produce aerogel for one-fifth the current cost, this also addresses a problem with disposing of rice husk waste.