Numerical analysis of melting of nano-enhanced phase change material in latent heat thermal energy storage system

Abstract

The heat transfer enhancement in the latent heat thermal energy storage system through dispersion of nanoparticle is reported. The resulting nanoparticle-enhanced phase change materials exhibit enhanced thermal conductivity in comparison to the base material. Calculation is performed for nanoparticle volume fraction from 0 to 0.08. In this study rectangular and cylindrical containers are modeled numerically and the effect of containers dimensions and nano particle volume fraction are studied. It has been found that the rectangular container requires half of the melting time as for the cylindrical container of the same volume and the same heat transfer area and also, higher nano particle volume fraction result in a larger solid fraction. The increase of the heat release rate of the nanoparticle-enhanced phase change materials shows its great potential for diverse thermal energy storage application.