Performance improvement of D-sorbitol PCM-based energy storage system with different fins

ABSTRACT

This paper is aimed at enhancing the heat exchange rate in the thermal energy storage system with dissimilar fins and encapsulation materials. Experimentation is done with d-sorbitol as phase change material with different encapsulating materials, copper, stainless steel (SS) and brass, in pin fin, annular fin and rectangular fin. The results are analysed for their thermal performance characteristics during both the charging and discharging processes. During charging, copper encapsulation showed a higher heat energy transfer rate around 2340 kJ. During discharging, a loss of 22% in heat extraction is seen in copper encapsulations, 6% and 19% in brass and SS encapsulations, respectively. These results show that the usage of annular fins is a valuable practice to increase the heat stored and recovered, in a latent heat storage system. The most cost-effective encapsulation is SS balls with annular fins as compared with copper and brass encapsulations.

KEYWORDS:

• Fins
• d-sorbitol
• effectiveness
• heat transfer
• energy storage

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

N. Beemkumar http://orcid.org/0000-0003-3868-0382

A. Karthikeyan http://orcid.org/0000-0003-0435-9822

J. Jayaprabakar http://orcid.org/0000-0003-3290-5771