Analysis of Paraffin Wax as a Phase Change Material

Abstract

As the energy demand increases and with the conventional fossil fuels depleting, the energy crisis in the near future is bound to worsen. Moreover fossil fuels have adverse effects on the environment so it is required to switch on to renewable sources of energy to meet the energy requirements. Especially solar energy is abundantly available but it is intermittent, unpredictable, and available only during the day. An efficient thermal energy storage system is required for storing the surplus energy available during light hours so that it can be used during nights. This paper is focused on the charging and discharge analysis of Paraffin wax (melting temperature of 58-600C) which is used as phase change material in thermal energy storage system. To analyse the performance of Paraffin wax, a simple and economical experimental setup has been constructed that consists of solar parabolic concentrator, hot water bath, water pump, test section, insulation boxes, T type thermocouple and Data acquisition system. In the experiment conducted, the water which gets heated due to the solar parabolic concentrator charges the Paraffin wax in the test section. Once the Paraffin wax gets fully charged, it is taken out and kept in the insulation box .The temperature variation with time while charging and discharging is recorded. It is found that Paraffin wax took 3 hours and 7 minutes for getting completely charged and it took 15 hours 28 minutes for discharging i.e. there was a temperature drop of 20.86 0C from the initial temperature of 69.9 0C