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IN BRIEF
• The Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil has ordered a total ban on deforestation by its members, amid growing pressure from both companies and consumers. Members voted overwhelmingly in favor of the ban at the group’s annual general assembly in Malaysia Nov. 15. The ban is now part of the RSPO core standards, which member companies must comply with for their products to be certified “sustainable.”
• Sunamp Ltd. reports that it has received $2.8 million in new seed funding. The latest round of investors includes Scottish Investment Bank, Equity Gap, PAR Equity and the Japanese energy utility Osaka Gas. Sunamp, based in Edinburgh, Scotland, recently signed a memo of understanding with Trina Solar to develop an integrated solution combining Sunamp heat batteries with heat pumps manufactured at Trina’s new factory in Changzhou, China.
• From Andreas Hauer, head of ZAE Bayern‘s Energy Storage Division; via LinkedIn: “The Progress Report for the working group ‘Material and Component Development for Thermal Energy Storage’ (http://task58.iea-shc.org/) has been approved by the Executive Committee of #IEA #EnergyStorage programme. One more year for international collaboration and inspiring discussions among material experts and applied scientist on advanced thermal energy storage!” Task 58 Annex 33 deals with advanced materials for latent and chemical thermal energy storage, PCMs and thermochemical materials.
• Registration is open for an all-day Workshop on Energy Efficient Buildings & Thermal Energy Storage Systems to be held Jan. 24 at the University of Nottingham in the United Kingdom. The free event “will present and discuss current innovations within the field of energy storage and efficiency in the built environment. Joining together industry and academia for discussions focussing on integrated solutions for residential, commercial and public buildings using renewable sources. Results will be presented from the ongoing TESSe2b European project, as well as results from other projects in the field of energy efficiency, generation & storage in buildings.”
• AQUACHILL Cool Coating, a water-based phase change material coating for bedding materials and other cooling applications, is among six Dow technologies to make R&D Magazine‘s 2018 R&D 100 list. The awards recognize “revolutionary technologies” introduced during the past year.
• The RAL Quality Association PCM‘s next meeting has been set for April 2, 2019, in Düsseldorf, Germany.
• A coalition led by the Energy Storage Association is calling on Congress to clarify that energy storage systems qualify for the Investment Tax Credit. The ESA said bipartisan legislation in the House and Senate would “ensure a level playing field” for storage resources.
• The U.S. Department of Energy‘s National Renewable Energy Laboratory has been awarded nearly $2.8 million to develop a system for grid electricity storage and power generation. The system includes a high-temperature charging device, low-cost thermal energy storage modules, a high-performance heat exchanger, and a closed-loop Brayton cycle turbine.
• Ecozen Solutions of India has won Rabobank’s inaugural Food Loss Challenge Asia. The award recognizes innovative ag-tech start-ups working to solve farm-to-market food loss problems. Ecozen, one of five finalists, won both the Jury’s Prize of $15,000 and the Audience’s Prize of $5,000. Ecozen makes portable solar cold rooms for small farms, using a thermal storage unit that can store power for more than 36 hours in case of cloudy or rainy weather.
• Energy Storage News reports that Lumenion‘s new storage technology, now being trialed in Berlin by Vattenfall, can store energy in steel structures for up to 48 hours. The technology is designed to provide low-cost energy storage for combined heat and power applications, using steel as the medium. The steel modules store energy thermally at up to 650 degrees Celsius.
PATENTS
Cooling device for charging station
U.S. patent application 20180334049 (applicant Porsche AG, Stuttgart, Germany):
“A cooling device cools a charging station or a multiplicity of charging stations of a charging park. The respective charging station has an internal coolant duct for a coolant to flow through the charging station, an input-side coolant connection, an output-side coolant connection, a coolant circuit with a cooling assembly for cooling the coolant, and a pump for pumping the coolant in the coolant circuit. The coolant duct of the respective charging station is integrated into the coolant circuit. A heat accumulator or a multiplicity of heat accumulators is integrated into the coolant circuit.”
Ceramic phase change container
U.S. patent application 20180339833 (applicant Blueleaf Lab Oy, Espoo, Finland):
“An article for holding foodstuff. The article comprises a receptacle (4) having a wall with an inner surface for holding the foodstuff and an opposite outer surface. The wall is formed of a first material, such as a ceramic material, having a first thermal conductivity. The article also has a shell (1; 5) spaced apart from the outer surface of the receptacle such as to define an interstitial chamber (2, 3) between the shell and the outer surface of the receptacle. The shell is at least partially formed of a ceramic material with a second thermal conductivity. Within the interstitial chamber, there is disposed a phase change material which abuts with at least the outer surface of the wall of the receptacle. The first thermal conductivity being greater than the second thermal conductivity, so as to allow for heat transfer through the wall to the phase change material, which will accumulate the heat.”
Cables made of phase change material
U.S. patent application 20180334775 (applicant E.I. du Pont de Nemours and Co., Wilmington, Del.):
“A phase change material (PCM) is useful for thermal management in various applications such as automotive, building, packaging, garments, and footwear, and in devices such as wires and cables. The cable described herein comprises a core and a PCM layer surrounding the core. The PCM layer comprises a PCM composition, which in turn comprises a 1,3-propanediol fatty acid ester. The core consists of a yarn, strand or wire made of a natural or synthetic polymeric material or a metal.”
Apparatus for controlling environmental conditions of substances
U.S. patent application 20180333330 (inventor Ron Nagar, Tel Aviv, Israel):
“An apparatus, comprising an environmental control element configured to control at least one environmental condition of a substance contained within a chamber, the environmental control element includes a thermal insulator configured to provide a thermal shield to the substance and a phase change material (PCM) configured to thermally regulate at least one environmental condition. The environmental control element is configured to control the environmental condition without use of an external power source, thereby allowing the apparatus to be thermally self-recharging.”
Multi-circuited phase change composite heat exchangers
U.S. patent application 20180340738 (applicant Alliance for Sustainable Energy LLC, Golden, Colo.):
“Disclosed herein are multi-circuit thermal energy storage (TES) systems connected in heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) systems. The two circuits (a refrigeration circuit and a secondary fluid circuit) are designed to work together, but they might contain separate units. In certain configurations, the TES system may use a phase change composite (PCC) with high thermal conductivity, which allows for efficient heat transfer within the PCC. Thus, the PCC itself may be used as the heat transfer media between a refrigerant and a secondary fluid, allowing the refrigerant/secondary fluid heat exchanger in typical configurations of HVAC systems to be removed.”
RESEARCH ROUNDUP
For our full list of recent academic research, see puretemp.com/academic. Here are highlights from the past week:
From Journal of Cleaner Production:• Autonomous greenhouse microclimate through hydroponic design and refurbished thermal energy by phase change material
From Journal of Energy Storage:
• Development of heat accumulation unit based on heterogeneous structure of MF/PCM for cogeneration units
From Textile Research Journal:
• Preparation and evaluation of thermo-regulating bamboo fabric treated by microencapsulated phase change materials
From International Journal of Clothing Science and Technology:
• Development of thermo-regulating fabrics using PCM microcapsules with poly(methyl methacrylate-co-2-hydroxy ethyl methacrylate) shell and n-alkane core
From Canadian Society for Mechanical Engineering International Congress:
• Preparation and Properties of Nanoparticle-enhanced Composite Phase Change Material with Ceramic Porous Media
From Solar Energy Materials and Solar Cells:
• A comprehensive review on phase change material emulsions: Fabrication, characteristics, and heat transfer performance
From 59th Conference on Simulation and Modelling:
• Convective Melting Modeling Approach for Phase Change Materials with Variable Boundary Heating
From Energy Conversion and Management:
• Simultaneous energy storage and recovery in the triplex-tube heat exchanger with PCM, copper fins and Al2O3 nanoparticles
From International Journal of Energy Research:
• Operation strategies guideline for packed bed thermal energy storage systems [pdf]
From Journal of Molecular Liquids:
• Solidification process of hybrid nano-enhanced phase change material in a LHTESS with tree-like branching fin in the presence of thermal radiation
From Energy:
• Experiment study on thermal performance of building integrated with double layers shape-stabilized phase change material wallboard
NETWORKING
Connect with PCM experts and industry leaders on LinkedIn
Nearly 1,400 people have joined a LinkedIn group devoted to the discussion of phase change material and thermal energy storage. The Phase Change Matters group is an interactive complement to the award-winning blog and newsletter of the same name.
You are invited to join the group and connect with PCM and TES experts from around the world. New members include Bhuvnesh Kumar, R&D application engineer at Pluss Advanced Technologies, Rewari, India; Fabiana Frota de Albuquerque Landi, architect and urban planner, Borlange, Sweden; Nikhil Mehta, manager at Ather Energy, Hyderabad, India; and Dr. Zahir Fikri, CEO at Smart Systems Pvt., Lahore, Pakistan. Zahir writes:
“I have been looking for a solution to use pcm thermal storage that is transportable on 10 ton, 20 ton or 40 ton truck. Some time back a German company developed such a module for 5 MW heat. Now I saw that Climatewell has come up with a 5 MW absorption cooling system using pcm thermal storage using solar energy.
“If we can find one such solution then the waste heat from power plants could become a useful commodity and could reduce the need for peak power generation. In Pakistan, about 15,000 MW waste heat from thermal power plants is just going into thin air.”