What is latent heat storage?

Latent heat storage refers to the storage or release of thermal energy during its phase change. When a solid Latent Heat Storage Material (LHSM) is heated, it’s sensible heat increases until it reaches the melting point. From the initiation of melting to the completion of melting the significant amount of heat is stored in the form of latent heat.

What is latent heat thermal energy storage (PCM)?

The corrosivity and stability of PCMs, which are commonly ignored in previous studies, are also examined. Summary Latent heat thermal energy storage refers to the storage and recovery of the latent heat during the melting/solidification process of a phase change material (PCM).

What is latent heat?

Latent heat provides substantially high energy storage density and maintains small temperature difference between the storage and release of heat . LHSMs can be of the form Solid–Solid (S–S), Solid–Liquid (S–L), Solid–Gas (S–G) and Liquid–Gas (L–G) based on the transformation type.

How does latent heat affect the size of a storage system?

Latent heat is measured in terms of a change in enthalpy during phase change. The higher the latent heat of fusion, the lower the amount of PCM; hence, the size of the storage system will be reduced. Solid–liquid phase interaction offers the highest enthalpy of fusion among other possible phase changes .

Why is latent heat storage better than conventional heat storage?

Latent heat storage has the higher storage density than conventional sensible heat storage due to high enthalpy change in the phase change process. Compared to the sensible heat storage systems, latent heat storage systems require a smaller weight and volume, which brings about the relatively lower costs.

How to evaluate latent thermal energy storage performance?

Usually the latent thermal energy storage performance can be assessed with the energy analysis and exergy analysis as the following equations: The heat storage ratio, which is the ratio of the total energy stored in the system to the maximum energy stored in the system, and the heat release factor are used to evaluate energy performance.