Influence of several parameters on heat storage and release enhancement behavior of latent heat storage paraffin with aluminum fiber materials

Recently, there has been some concern in the latent heat energy storage system as a practical means of reducing energy consumption and as an effective solution against the gap between on-peak and off-peak electrical power demand. Paraffin is used as the latent heat energy storage material, because paraffin has relatively high latent heat and various melting points. However, the low thermal conductivity of paraffin leads to more time to latent heat storage and release processes. Therefore, it is necessary to improve the latent heat storage and release processes of paraffin. In our laboratory, it is noted that the metal fiber materials are mixed to the paraffin in order to enhance the effective thermal conductivity of paraffin. The present investigation deals with the heat storage and heat release process of the paraffin with metal fiber materials as a function of volumetric fiber fraction and heating (cooling) temperature, experimentally. As a result, the heat release characteristic of paraffin with metal fiber materials was improved by enhanced effective thermal conductivity. On the other hand, the heat storage process of paraffin with metal fiber materials was influenced by the natural convection flow, and it remains independent of the volumetric fiber fraction because of the interaction between enhanced effective thermal conductivity and suppression of the natural convection flow by the metal fiber materials.