Title: Latent Heat Storage During Melting and Solidification of a Phase Change Material (PCM) Embedded with a Porous Matrix of High Thermal Conductivity
Abstract: The objective of the present work is to analyse numerically the effect of embedding a porous matrix (PMX) of high thermal conductivity within a phase change material (PCM) on the heat energy storage and recovery during the melting and solidification of a PCM. Most of the previous work put the insight mainly on the charging process during melting. The present study focuses on both charging and discharging during melting and solidification. Constant heat flux is applied through the left wall of a rectangular storage unit. The other walls are kept thermally insulated. At the end of the heating period, a cooling stage starts to extract the heat through the same wall. The ratio of thermal conductivities of the porous matrix and the PCM will be taken as a parameter to study the efficiency of the thermal storage. Results are presented in terms of temperature fields, liquid-solid interface progress and plots of latent, and sensible heat storage. The study shows that a significant improvement in the heat storage/recovery can be achieved. For better efficiency, a compromise should be established between the ratio of thermal conductivity and the heating period.
Publication Year: 2020
Publication Date: 2020-01-01
Language: en
Type: article
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Cited By Count: 4
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