Experimental Study on Thermal Discharge Performance of A Phase Change Thermal Storage Material

A thermal energy storage (TES) equipment utilizing phase change material (PCM) was designed and built. The PCM is sealed inside metal tubes and exchanges heat with process fluid flowing outside. The storage capacity characteristics of the system was analyzed based on date covering the inlet and outlet temperatures of the process fluid, volumetric flow rate of the process fluid, and temperature change of the PCM. In this paper, an experimental investigation of the thermal discharging features of thermal storage equipment using phase change materials is reported. The unit operated with process fluids flowing in coil tubes submerged in the PCM. The volumetric flow rate, inlet and outlet temperatures of the process fluid together with the temperature change of the PCM were measured and analysis to evaluate the performance of the equipment.