Study on heat-storage and release characteristics of multi-cavity-structured phase-change microcapsules

Abstract

Based on the solutions of apparent heat capacity method for phase-change problems, numerical simulations were performed to study the heat-storage and release processes for the multi-cavity-structured phase-change microcapsules in this paper. Moreover, the influence of the cavity structures of the phase-change microcapsules on the heat-storage and release capacity was analyzed. The results show that the rate of heat-storage and release will be accelerated by increasing the number of cavities in microcapsules, and cavity interlayer is the key factor to enhance the heat transfer.

Keywords:

• phase-change microcapsules
• multi-cavity structure
• apparent heat capacity method
• heat storage
• heat release

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

The authors acknowledge the financial support provided by the National Natural Science Foundation of China [grant number 51106151], [grant number 51306183]; the Natural Science Foundation of Hebei Province [grant number E2014210060]; and the National Basic Research Program of China [grant number 2012CB933200].