Study of the solidification process of a phase change material contained in a heat exchanger with the presence of a porous medium

Abstract

The present study is conducted in order to evaluate the impact of a porous medium containing a phase change material (PCM) on the heat transfer behaviour in triple tubes heat exchanger, using Ansys fluent software. The non-thermal equilibrium model is adopted. Different influences such as introducing a porous medium, the numbers of the fins and the fins position are studied. The time of PCM solidification is reduced to 10 times using a porous medium.  Compared with a heat exchanger with a porous medium, a heat exchanger with a porous medium and with fins results in a reduction of the solidification time. In addition, the free convection is eliminated. If the number of fins increases, the solidification time will be reduced. We found that the position of the fins has no great influence on the solidification process.

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5755/j01.mech.22.5.13307