Performance analysis of phase-change material storage unit for both heating and cooling of buildings

Utilisation of solar energy and the night ambient (cool) temperatures are the passive ways of heating and cooling of buildings. Intermittent and time-dependent nature of these sources makes thermal energy storage vital for efficient and continuous operation of these heating and cooling techniques. Latent heat thermal energy storage by phase-change materials (PCMs) is preferred over other storage techniques due to its high-energy storage density and isothermal storage process. The current study was aimed to evaluate the performance of the air-based PCM storage unit utilising solar energy and cool ambient night temperatures for comfort heating and cooling of a building in dry-cold and dry-hot climates. The performance of the studied PCM storage unit was maximised when the melting point of the PCM was ～29°C in summer and 21°C during winter season. The appropriate melting point was ～27.5°C for all-the-year-round performance. At lower melting points than 27.5°C, declination in the cooling capacity of the storage unit was more profound as compared to the improvement in the heating capacity. Also, it was concluded that the melting point of the PCM that provided maximum cooling during summer season could be used for winter heating also but not vice versa.     

Optimal roof structure with multilayer cooling function materials for building energy saving

Both cool roof and phase change thermal storage are promising technologies in decreasing building energy consumption. Combining these two technologies is likely to further enhance the thermal comfort of the building as well as reduce air condition loads. In this paper, the cooling performance and energy-saving effects of four types of roof (normal roof, phase change material [PCM] roof, cool roof, and cool PCM roof [cool roof coupled with PCM]) were investigated under a simulated sunlight. Experimental results indicate that compared with normal roof, the other three roofs are able to narrow the indoor temperature fluctuation and decrease the heat flow entering into the room. Among them, cool PCM roof gave the best energy-saving effect that can lower the indoor temperature and heat entering into rooms by 6.6°C and 52.9%, respectively. Besides, the PCM location, PCM thickness, and insulation thickness exerted great impacts on the cooling performance of the roof. Placing the PCM on the internal layer beneath the extruded polystyrene (XPS) insulation board can make the indoor temperature 1.2°C lower than that on the middle layer. Although thicker PCM panels or insulation boards can provide a better thermal insulation, 5 mm in PCM thickness and 20 mm in insulation thickness are enough to guarantee the indoor temperature of cool PCM roof system at a comfortable range (22°C-28°C) for a whole day. These findings will give guidance in designing buildings with a light and compact roof structure to decrease energy consumption and improve comfort level.     

Heat pipe with PCM for electronic cooling

This article experimentally investigates the thermal performances of a heat pipe with phase change material for electronic cooling. The adiabatic section of heat pipe is covered by a storage container with phase change material (PCM), which can store and release thermal energy depending upon the heating powers of evaporator and fan speeds of condenser. Experimental investigations are conducted to obtain the system temperature distributions from the charge, discharge and simultaneous charge/discharge performance tests. The parameters in this study include three kinds of PCMs, different filling PCM volumes, fan speeds, and heating powers in the PCM cooling module. The cooling module with tricosane as PCM can save 46% of the fan power consumption compared with the traditional heat pipe.     

Energy saving in building with PCM cold storage

This article presents an experimental and numerical analysis of cooling buildings using night‐time cold accumulation in phase change material (PCM), otherwise known as the ‘free‐cooling principle’. Experimental and numerical studies of the ceiling and floor free‐cooling principle, as well as passive cooling, are presented. The free‐cooling principle is explained and some of the types of PCMs suitable for summer cooling are listed. An experiment was conducted using paraffin with a melting point of 22°C as the PCM to store cold during the night‐time and to cool hot air during the daytime in summer. Air temperatures and heat fluxes as a function of time and dimensionless cold discharging values are presented for different air velocities. Experimental analysis of one week of measuring under real conditions is presented in order to show how cold storage functions. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Cooling strategies,summer comfort and energy performance of a rehabilitated passive standard office building

One of the first rehabilitated passive energy standard office buildings in Europe was extensively monitored over two years to analyse the cooling performance of a ground heat exchanger and mechanical night ventilation together with the summer comfort in the building. To increase the storage mass in the light weight top floor, phase change materials (PCM) were used in the ceiling and wall construction. The earth heat exchanger installed at a low depth of 1.2 m has an excellent electrical cooling coefficient of performance of 18, but with an average cooling power of about 1.5 kW does not contribute significantly to cooling load removal. Mechanical night ventilation with 2 air changes also delivered cold at a good coefficient of performance of 6 with 14 kW maximum power. However, the night air exchange was too low to completely discharge the ceilings, so that the PCM material was not effective in a warm period of several days. In the ground floor offices the heat removal through the floor to ground of 2–3 W m⁻² K⁻¹ was in the same order of magnitude than the charging heat flux of the ceilings. The number of hours above 26 °C was about 10% of all office hours. The energy performance of the building is excellent with a total primary energy consumption for heating and electricity of 107–115 kW h m⁻² a⁻¹, without computing equipment only 40–45 kW h m⁻² a⁻¹.     

Experimental performance of a thermoelectric ceiling cooling panel

An experiment has been performed to investigate the cooling performance of a thermoelectric ceiling cooling panel (TE‐CCP). The TE‐CCP was composed of 36 TE modules. The cold side of the TE modules was fixed to an aluminum ceiling panel to cool a test chamber of 4.5 m³ volume, while a copper heat exchanger with circulating cooling water at the hot side of the TE modules was used for heat release. Tests were conducted using various system parameters. It was found that the cooling performance of the system depended on the electrical supply, cooling water temperature and flow rate through the heat exchanger. A suitable condition occurred at 1.5 A of current flow with a corresponding cooling capacity of 289.4 W which gives the coefficient of performance (COP) of 0.75 with an average indoor temperature of 27°C. Using thermal comfort test data in literature for small air movements under radiant cooling ceilings, results from the experiments show that thermal comfort could be obtained with the TE‐CCP system. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Development and thermal performance of wood-HPDE- PCM nanocapsule floor for passive cooling in building

Cooling demand in the building sector is growing rapidly; thermal energy storage systems using phase change materials (PCM) can be a very useful way to improve the building thermal performance. This work shows the benefits of PCM when incorporated in wood fiber-polymer composite as floor cooling system using nano-encapsulated PCMs. The wood-plastic-NPCM composites were produced using compression molding process and its mechanical and thermal properties were investigated. Two dynamic simulators were employed to investigate synthesized composites thermal performance. Increasing NPCM content in WPC showed that the fluctuations of the simulator temperature was decreased while the heat fluxes through the floor was increased. The variations of ambient maximum temperature have little effect on the air temperature of the simulator with 40% PCM which indicates that the amount of PCM was enough for studied environmental condition. Field experiments were performed using two medium-scale test houses located on Tehran-Iran. It can be concluded that using NPCM helps to reduce heating and cooling demand. Moreover, the natural night ventilation by opening windows reduced the number of hours that the temperature is above 23°C from 499 h/year in case1 (without opening) to 255 h/year in case 2(with opening). This means that natural night ventilation could help reduce the overheating period to about 50% with the use of NPCM.     

Numerical analysis of temperature non-uniformity and cooling capacity for capillary ceiling radiant cooling panel

Capillary ceiling radiant cooling panel is a high temperature cooling system, which could pose low energy consumption to meet thermal comfort requirements. A computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulation study on heat transfer of chilled water flow in the capillary of ceiling radiant cooling panel was performed to attain surface temperature distributions and cooling capacities. Six influencing factors included chilled water inlet parameters, conditions of gypsum plaster and capillary mats structural parameters were considered to obtain the complicated relationships between capillary radiant panel conditions and heat transfer performance. The index of temperature non-uniformity coefficient was proposed to evaluate temperature profiles of ceiling panel surface. The results of the simulation were compared with the values depicted in ASHRAE Handbook and good agreement had been achieved. The average difference between simulation results and the values reported by ASHRAE handbook was within the region of 15%. The research results showed that temperature non-uniformity coefficient was negatively correlated with temperature of chilled inlet water (linear correlation), water velocity (correlation coefficient R = −0.85), and pipe diameter (correlation coefficient R = −0.93), but positively and linearly correlated with tube spacing. Cooling capacity was found to have negative linear correlation with temperature of chilled inlet water, covering thickness and tube spacing.     

Improved heating floor thermal performance by adding PCM microcapsules enhanced by single and hybrid nanoparticles

A heating floor is a low-temperature emitter consisting of pipelines in which a fluid circulates between 35°C and 45°C. To ensure energy efficiency, occupant comfort, and building material durability, proper heat management is crucial in buildings. By using phase change materials (PCMs) in building envelopes, the indoor temperature can be regulated through the storage and release of thermal energy, which reduces energy consumption and enhances occupant comfort. In this study, we evaluated numerically a heating floor that incorporates a PCM enhanced by nanoparticles (NePCM). The aim of the numerical analysis is to assess the impact of the addition of single and hybrid nanoparticles in different proportions to the PCM layer on the thermal performance of the PCM-based floor. Therefore, two main objectives are defined. The primary is to take advantage of the storage capacity of a PCM layer by integrating it into the ground; second, to evaluate the hot water temperature levels effect on the floor's performance. Additionally, we address the low thermal conductivity of PCM by enhancing PCM microcapsules with single and hybrid nanoparticles and comparing them to pure PCM. The numerical results obtained show that positioning the PCM microcapsules above the heating tubes (upper position) provides an optimum improvement in thermal performance. Moreover, the addition of hybrid nanoparticles within the base PCM, 1% of Cu mixed with 4% of Al₂O₃, allows an increase of 4°C, which relates to a reduction of 18% in the internal temperature amplitude and a phase shift of 6 h 30 min compared with the conventional heated floor in which there is no PCM.     

基于辐射供冷的太阳能吸收式空调试验研究

对基于辐射供冷的太阳能吸收式空调系统进行了试验。该系统采用96 m2的U型管式真空管太阳能集热器驱动额定制冷量为8 kW的吸收式制冷机组,吸收式制冷机产生的冷冻水被输送到辐射吊顶中,为50 m2的实验室提供夏季空调。吸收式制冷机运行在夏季晴朗天气时,平均制冷量为4.5 kW。辅助独立除湿机组与辐射吊顶联合运行。试验房间的热舒适指标PMV为-0.29~0.32,可满足热舒适要求。     

辐射供冷系统末端形式对比及发展研究

介绍几种辐射供冷空调的末端形式,比较冷吊顶、楼板辐射供冷、毛细管席的供冷能力、热舒适性、能耗及投资等方面的不同,并建议完善辐射供冷系统试验研究方法,着重进行拥有自主产权产品的制造工艺的研究。     

Evaluation of paraffin/water emulsion as a phase change slurry for cooling applications

A Phase Change Slurry (PCS) is a latent heat storage and transfer medium consisting of a Phase Change Material (PCM) as a dispersed phase and a carrier fluid as a continuous phase. PCSs have a high energy density because they use not only the sensible heat capacity of the carrier fluid, but also the latent heat capacity of the PCM during the phase transition. In this paper, a paraffin/water emulsion has been studied as a PCS for comfort cooling applications in a temperature range of 0–20 °C. A paraffin blend having a melting temperature range of 2–12 °C was used for preparing the emulsion. The properties of the emulsion were studied in view of the application requirements on PCSs. The dependence between the paraffin fraction and emulsion properties was investigated. The stability of the emulsion was examined both during the storage period and under mechanical–thermal loads in a test rig by determining the change in the properties. The results indicate that the paraffin/water emulsion containing a paraffin weight fraction of 30–50 wt.% is an attractive candidate for cold storage and distribution applications.     

吊顶辐射冷却塔供冷系统试验研究与性能分析

通过供冷试验及TRNSYS软件模拟研究了吊顶辐射冷却塔供冷系统的运行效果,分析了气象参数、部件结构等因素对系统供冷效果的影响,并与常规供冷系统全年的运行能耗进行对比。试验与理论分析结果表明,吊顶辐射冷却塔供冷系统的有效供冷量能够满足用户供冷需要,供冷房间温度稳定且分布均匀。冷却塔供冷效果与大气湿球温度、建筑内部负荷、热交换器结构等因素有关。辐射顶板末端与冷却塔供冷匹配性高,系统全年运行时数增加,应用于需全年供冷的建筑节能效果显著。     

Microencapsulated dimethyl terephthalate phase change material for heat transfer fluid performance enhancement

Micro‐phase change materials (micro‐PCMs) are proposed to increase the thermal conductivity and the thermal energy storage capacity of a heat transfer fluid (HTF). In this work, we have selected dimethyl terephthalate (DMT) to be used as a PCM for performance enhancement of a synthetic oil in the temperature range of approximately 100 to 170 °C. Silicon dioxide (SiO₂) was used as the microencapsulant, because of its desirable properties as containment material, including thermal stability. The SiO₂‐coated DMT micro‐PCM was characterized to determine relevant properties and its suitability for HTF performance enhancement. The SiO₂‐coated DMT was found to completely disperse in the synthetic oil, Therminol SP, silicone oil, at and above 100 °C. FTIR, thermal diffusivity and differential scanning calorimetry measurements were carried out on the materials, and these tests demonstrated that the coated particles can be used for HTF enhancement in the temperature range of 100–170 °C and potentially higher temperatures if pressurized pipes/vessels are utilized. Using the measured thermal diffusivity and known data for density and specific heat capacity, the thermal conductivity of the micro‐PCM was calculated. Our calculations indicate that both the thermal conductivity and the thermal energy storage heat capacity of the HTF would be enhanced by the addition of this micro‐PCM. It is expected that the thermal conductivity increase will enhance the heat transfer of the fluid when in use at temperatures above and below the melting temperature of the PCM. At the melting point, the latent heat of the PCM will increase the thermal energy storage capacity of the fluid. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Approximate analytical model for PCM solidification in a rectangular finned container with convective cooling boundaries

Thermal energy storage units that utilize latent heat storage materials have received increased attention in the recent years because of their relatively large heat storage capacities and isothermal behavior during charging and discharging. In this study, an analytical approach is presented for the prediction of temperature during the solidification in a two-dimensional rectangular latent heat storage using a phase change material (PCM) with internal plate fins. The basic energy equation is formulated accounting for the presence of a heat thermal fluid (HTF) on the walls. A two-dimensional numerical model is developed based on the enthalpy method to predict the distribution temperature of the fin and solid–liquid interface in storage. Results from the analytical solution and numerical model show a good agreement. The developed analytical model estimates satisfactorily the solidification time of PCM in storage, which is useful in the design of PCM-based thermal energy storages and cooling systems.     

Passive cooling in a low-energy office building

In office buildings, the use of passive cooling techniques combined with a reduced cooling load may result in a good thermal summer comfort and therefore save cooling energy consumption. This is shown in the low-energy office building ‘SD Worx’ in Kortrijk (Belgium), in which natural night ventilation and an earth-to-air heat exchanger are applied. In winter, the supply air is successively heated by the earth-to-air heat exchanger and the regenerative heat exchanger, which recovers the heat from the exhaust air. In summer, the earth-to-air heat exchanger cools the ventilation air by day. In addition, natural night ventilation cools down the exposed structure which has accumulated the heat of the previous day. In this article the overall thermal comfort in the office building is evaluated by means of measuring and simulation results. Measurements of summer 2002 are discussed and compared to simulations with a coupled thermal and ventilation simulation model TRNSYS-COMIS. The simulations are used to estimate the relative importance of the different techniques. The evaluation shows that passive cooling has an important impact on the thermal summer comfort in the building. Furthermore, natural night ventilation appears to be much more effective than an earth-to-air heat exchanger to improve comfort.     

管内流体流动管外PCM发生相变的贮能系统热性能研究

建立了分析空调贮能系统中管内流体流动管外PCM发生相变的相变的贮能器热性能的数学模型，并进行了数值计算。其中，把传热流体看作是沿轴向的—维无粘流动，对PCM相变过程的求解用显热容法。计算结果与文献中的计算结果吻合较好。所得结论对该类贮能系统的设计和性能优化有一定指导作用。     

Improvements of building envelope using passive cooling techniques to reduce the cooling load in hot‐dry regions

In developed countries, the buildings are responsible for massive energy consumption. When the construction is based on the use of nonsustainable methods, the buildings were dependent on the active systems, for ensuring a maximal indoor comfort. This has increased energy consumption and related greenhouse gas emissions. In this study, a reduction technique of cooling load and power consumption in buildings is proposed. This technique involves the combination of three passive cooling techniques, thermal insulation, phase change materials (PCMs), and electrochromic double glazing. These techniques are applied through simulation software “DesignBuilder” to a building envelope model in various areas like walls, roofs, and glazing. For this purpose, a standard building model is compared with 16 other cases that incorporated the passive cooling techniques for determining the effectiveness of the proposed method. The results show that a combination of PCMs, thermal insulation, and double glazing can reduce the cooling load from 70.37 to 50.53 kW and the energy consumption from 1.51 to 0.90 kWh/m ².     

The application of a validated numerical model to predict the energy conservation potential of using phase change materials in the fabric of a building

Phase change materials absorb a large amount of energy as latent heat at a constant phase transition temperature and are thus used for passive heat storage and temperature control, example applications include electronics, and storage of perishable items. Encapsulated phase change materials incorporated into gypsum wallboards of buildings may be suitable for absorbing solar energy directly, reducing temperature rise. Improvement in human comfort is to be expected due to a decrease in the frequency and magnitude of internal air temperature swings, maintaining the temperature closer to the desired set temperature passively for a long period of time.This paper summarises the results of a detailed theoretical investigation and analysis of thermal energy storage and temperature control achieved using passive building construction elements incorporating phase change materials. The predictions detail the effects of using various quantities of different PCM materials with phase change temperatures of 28 and 43 °C incorporated into a selection of wall constructions for selected ambient conditions of temperature and insolation. From this parametric study, optimum arrangements are proposed.     

Photovoltaic-thermal collectors for night radiative cooling of buildings

A new photovoltaic-thermal (PVT) system has been developed to produce electricity and cooling energy. Experimental studies of uncovered PVT collectors were carried out in Stuttgart to validate a simulation model, which calculates the night radiative heat exchange with the sky. Larger PVT frameless modules with 2.8 m² surface area were then implemented in a residential zero energy building and tested under climatic conditions of Madrid. Measured cooling power levels were between 60 and 65 W m⁻², when the PVT collector was used to cool a warm storage tank and 40-45 W m⁻², when the energy was directly used to cool a ceiling. The ratio of cooling energy to electrical energy required for pumping water through the PVT collector at night was excellent with values between 17 and 30. The simulated summer cooling energy production per square meter of PVT collector in the Madrid/Spain climatic conditions is 51 kWh m⁻² a⁻¹. In addition to the thermal cooling gain, 205 kWh m⁻² a⁻¹ of AC electricity is produced under Spanish conditions. A comparative analysis for the hot humid climate of Shanghai gave comparable results with 55 kWh m⁻² a⁻¹ total cooling energy production, mainly usable for heat rejection of a compression chiller and a lower electricity production of 142 kWh m⁻² a⁻¹.