Inorganic salt hydrate for thermal energy storage application: A review

Abstract

Salt hydrates are one of the most common inorganic compounds that are used as phase change material (PCM). These are available for a wide range of phase transition temperature for thermal energy storage (TES) application. They have some most desired properties for TES applications like high latent heat value, good thermal conductivity, nonexpensive, and were nonflammable. Besides these, due to the undesirable properties like phase segregation, supercooling, and corrosion to the containers, this PCM not recommended for TES application. To mitigate these issues and to make salt hydrates suitable in TES application, much research has been carried out in past years. This main highlight of this article is to provide a comprehensive overview of the use of salt hydrates, their applications and summarize the research outcomes reported by various researchers to every issue for its TES application. This summarized information will be useful to those who are interested to work on this research area. Along with this literature focuses on the advantages, disadvantages, and mechanism of salt hydrates for TES system during its thermal cycle process.