HEAT TRANSFER ANALYSIS OF A LOW-TEMPERATURE HEAT PIPE-ASSISTED LATENT HEAT THERMAL ENERGY STORAGE SYSTEM WITH NANO-ENHANCED PCM

In the current study, the thermal characteristics of a low temperature latent heat thermal energy storage system are studied numerically. A cylinder container encloses a paraffin based PCM, which is heated via a heat transfer fluid passing through a tube at the center. Heat pipes are incorporated into the PCM to enhance the heat transfer rate between the heat transfer fluid and the PCM. In addition, high thermal conductive nanoparticles are dispersed into the PCM to increase its thermal conductivity. A transient model is developed using ANSYS-FLUENT to simulate the charging process and study the impact of heat pipes and nanoparticles on the performance of the system. The effects of different parameters, such as the quantities of heat pipes as well as the nanoparticles types and volume fraction, are investigated.