Thermal conductivity measurement of erythritol, xylitol, and their blends for phase change material design: A methodological study

Abstract

Summary This work presents and discusses a detailed thermal conductivity assessment of erythritol, xylitol, and their blends: 25 mol% erythritol and 80 mol% erythritol using the transient plane source (TPS) method with a Hot Disk Thermal Constants Analyzer TPS‐2500S. Thereby, the thermal conductivities of xylitol, 25 mol% erythritol, 80 mol% erythritol, and erythritol were here found for respectively in the solid state to be 0.373, 0.394, 0.535, and 0.589 W m−1 K−1 and in the liquid state to be 0.433, 0.402, 0.363, and 0.321 W m−1 K−1. These obtained results are comprehensively and critically analyzed as compared to available literature data on the same materials, in the phase change materials (PCMs) design context. This study clearly indicates that these thermal conductivity data in literature have considerable discrepancies between the literature sources and as compared to the data obtained in the present investigation. Primary reasons for these disparities are identified here as the lack of sufficiently transparent and repeatable data and procedure reporting, and relevant standards in this context. To exemplify the significance of such transparent and repeatable data reporting in thermal conductivity evaluations in the PCM design context, here focused on the TPS method, a comprehensive measurement validation is discussed along various residual plots obtained for varying input parameters (ie, the heating power and time). Clearly, the variations in the input parameters give rise to various thermal conductivity results, where choosing the most coherent result requires a sequence of efforts per material, because there are no universally valid conditions. Transparent and repeatable data and procedure reporting are the key to achieve comparable thermal conductivity results, which are essential for the correct design of thermal energy storage systems using PCMs.

Sugar-alcohol@ZIF nanocomposites display suppressed phase-change temperatures

“…These values correspond closely to the literature reported phase change temperatures of erythritol and xylitol, respectively. 37 More interesting are the results for the XZ and EZ samples shown in Fig. 4a and b.…”

Numerical Study of a Latent Heat Storage System’s Performance as a Function of the Phase Change Material’s Thermal Conductivity

“…Increasing the PCM's thermal conductivity could also directly affect that material's ability to move heat to and from the exchange media, increasing the system's heat transfer rate [27]. But by how much does the thermal conductivity of a PCM need to be increased to positively impact the design and performance of a LHESS?…”

Preparation and characterization of erythritol/polyaniline form‐stable phase change materials containing silver nanowires

“…27 Hence, the thermal conductivity of sugar alcohols needs to be enhanced. 2 Thermal conductivity of PCMs can be improved in two ways. One way is to impregnate PCMs in high thermal conductive porous materials such as expanded graphite 7,28 or metal foam.…”