Comparação de modelos numéricos de malha fixa baseados em entalpia para os processos de fusão e de solidificação de PCM em esfera

Abstract

Thermal energy storage presents great potential of utilization in several applications, such as solar energy, HVAC systems, food conservation or waste heat recovery in industrial processes. Latent heat thermal energy storage is realized with phase change materials (PCM), through solidification and melting processes. Representation of such processes through numerical simulation is performed with the addition to the basic numerical model, composed of the conservation equations of mass, momentum and energy, models to account the latent heat and the velocity transition between the phases, such as: Darcy STM (source term method), VVM (variable viscosity method) and SOM (switch-off method). However, the large majority of the research on such area employ the first method. Besides that, there are few comparative studies of different methods to describe phase change processes. Thus, the objective of the present work is compare Darcy STM, VVM and mixed method (using elements of the two prior) in the simulation of melting and solidification processes of PCM RT27 inside a sphere. The study was realized using computational fluid dynamics, with the finite volume method. The numerical model was validated with experimental results from literature. Quantitative and qualitative results of liquid fraction show that Darcy STM is most suitable to solidification process, while VVM produces results closer to experimental in the melting process. Computational cost was smaller for Darcy STM and greater for VVM, while mixed method presents computational cost slightly lower than the one of VVM. In the analysis of the liquid layer in close contact melting, were analyzed descending velocity of the solid, liquid layer thickness and the flow in the liquid layer. The results regarding the liquid layer denote significant influence of the configurations for Darcy STM. However, such results are little influenced by the configurations of VVM.