Experimental evaluation of Phase Change Materials (PCM) for energy storage in solar water heating systems

Abstract

In this paper the use of Phase Change Materials (PCM) in solar storage tanks is evaluated experimentally. Hot water storage tank is one of the main components of any solar water heating system. It is important to increase the storage capacity. The experimental investigations of the operation of the storage tank were carried out both during heating up and draw off phases. In all experiments the tanks with PCM show better performance than the tank without PCM. For the 50l tank used, two PCM canisters showed the optimum performance and a draw off profile up to 3 l/min. An additional experiment was performed with intermitted withdrawal of water from the storage tank so as to simulate the actual use. The results were also positive. It is concluded that the use of PCM improves storage capacity of such systems during draw-off.