Innovative development of fired clay bricks using agricultural–industrial wastes as eco-friendly ceramic modifiers: A review and insights for sustainability in Al-Kharj Governorate

Abstract The urgent need to decarbonise masonry has accelerated research on fired clay bricks (FCBs) incorporating agro-industrial wastes as partial clay substitutes or functional additives. Yet evidence remains fragmented across waste types, preprocessing routes, mix strategies, and firing regimes, and existing reviews focus largely on conventional mineral by-products, offering limited synthesis tailored to arid contexts where salt exposure and moisture transport can govern durability. This systematic review consolidates and organises the literature on waste-modified FCBs by underlining waste classes (e.g., crop ashes and husks, bagasse and palm wastes, paper-sludge derivatives), preprocessing and forming routes, substitution/addition ranges, and firing windows, and by synthesising reported performance for physicomechanical, hygrothermal, and durability indicators (including compressive strength, density, porosity, water absorption, shrinkage, efflorescence, and thermal conductivity). Across the reviewed studies, workable incorporation is most frequently reported at low-to-moderate dosages (approximately about 20 wt%), with higher contents more often increasing porosity and water uptake and reducing strength, while thermal benefits are consistently observed when combustible waste generate controlled pore structures. Quantitative evidence indicates that moderate waste additions (about 2–25 wt%) can lower brick density by as much as 10%, raise total porosity by around 35%, and reduce thermal conductivity by approximately 40% while maintaining compressive strength above 10 MPa, although outcomes vary with waste chemistry, particle size, and firing temperature. The main contribution of this study is to review and evaluate FCBs incorporating agricultural and industrial wastes as eco-friendly ceramic modifiers and to translate these findings into a practical implementation framework with targeted sustainability insights for Al-Kharj Governorate. However, this framework would connect waste characteristics, processing decisions, and firing conditions to attainable performance profiles, supported by a harmonised reporting template that improves cross-study comparability and informs material selection, quality control, and future life-cycle and long-term durability assessments for Al-Kharj and comparable regions.