The most significant threat that mankind faces in the 21th century is global warming. Buildings, which account for 40% of global energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions, play a pivotal role in global warming. Estimates show that their destructive impact will grow by 1.8% per year through 2050, which indicates that future consumption and emissions will be worse than today. Therefore, the impact of cooling systems cannot be ignored, as they, along with ventilation and heating systems, account for 60% of the energy consumed in buildings. Passive cooling techniques are a promising alternative to conventional cooling systems. Of the various passive cooling strategies, thermal energy storage by means of latent heat is an efficient way to increase the thermal inertia of building envelopes, which would reduce temperature fluctuations, leading to the improved thermal comfort of occupants. Phase change materials (PCMs) with high density for thermal energy storage can be efficiently employed to this purpose. This paper reviews recent studies of the application of PCMs for passive cooling in buildings. From the literature, a comprehensive list of different organic, inorganic and eutectic PCMs appropriate for passive cooling in buildings are reviewed. Full-scale testing and numerical modeling were found to be the most popular investigative methods used for experimental and theoretical analysis of PCMs. The combination of these two methods can provide a detailed and valid technique for PCM investigations. Finally, incorporating PCMs into building walls with macro encapsulation was also a dominant interest in previous studies.

A review on phase change material (PCM) for sustainable passive cooling in building envelopes

Phase change materials (PCM) for cooling applications in buildings: A review

A review of performance enhancement of PCM based latent heat storage system within the context of materials, thermal stability and compatibility

Continuous ultrathin graphite foams (UGFs) have been actively researched recently to obtain composite materials with increased thermal conductivities. However, the large pore size of these graphitic foams has resulted in large thermal resistance values for heat conduction from inside the pore to the high thermal conductivity graphitic struts. Here, we demonstrate that the effective thermal conductivity of these UGF composites can be increased further by growing long CNT networks directly from the graphite struts of UGFs into the pore space. When erythritol, a phase change material for thermal energy storage, is used to fill the pores of UGF-CNT hybrids, the thermal conductivity of the UGF-CNT/erythritol composite was found to increase by as much as a factor of 1.8 compared to that of a UGF/erythritol composite, whereas breaking the UGF-CNT bonding in the hybrid composite resulted in a drop in the effective room-temperature thermal conductivity from about 4.1 ± 0.3 W m(-1) K(-1) to about 2.9 ± 0.2 W m(-1) K(-1) for the same UGF and CNT loadings of about 1.8 and 0.8 wt %, respectively. Moreover, we discovered that the hybrid structure strongly suppresses subcooling of erythritol due to the heterogeneous nucleation of erythritol at interfaces with the graphitic structures.

Continuous Carbon Nanotube-Ultrathin Graphite Hybrid Foams for Increased Thermal Conductivity and Suppressed Subcooling in Composite Phase Change Materials

Salt hydrates as latent heat storage materials:Thermophysical properties and costs

A comparative study of the CFD modeling of a ventilated active façade including phase change materials

Static and dynamic thermal characterisation of a hollow brick wall: Tests and numerical analysis

Ventilated active façades with PCM

Influence of the experimental conditions on the subcooling of Glauber's salt when used as PCM

Corrosion behaviour of several aluminium alloys in contact with a thermal storage phase change material based on Glauber’s salt

A. Urresti

Papers

A comparative study of the CFD modeling of a ventilated active façade including phase change materials

Static and dynamic thermal characterisation of a hollow brick wall: Tests and numerical analysis

Ventilated active façades with PCM

Influence of the experimental conditions on the subcooling of Glauber's salt when used as PCM

Corrosion behaviour of several aluminium alloys in contact with a thermal storage phase change material based on Glauber’s salt