Experimental Investigation on Solidification Behaviour of Water Base Nanofluid PCM for Building Cooling Applications

The objective of the present work is to explore the solidification behaviour of Nanoparticle Enhanced Phase Change Material (NFPCM) for various cooling application at various experimental conditions. The NFPCM was prepared by dispersing the graphene nanoplatelets at various concentrations of 0.2 wt. %, 0.4 wt. % and 0.6 wt. % in DI water as the base PCM. The surfactant used was sodium dodecyl benzene sulphate (SDBS) and thermal conductivity of prepared NFPCM was measured at different surrounding bath temperature. The experimental results showed that 9.5 % enhancement in thermal conductivity with addition of 0.6 wt. % of graphene nanoplatelets when compared with base PCM, due to increase in surface area and high thermal conductivity of graphene nanoplatelets. Further experimental have been carried out in order to find out the solidification behaviour of the NFPCM. It was observed that the existence of GNPs decreases the subcooling appreciably and the reduction in solidification time was achieved 18 % and 24 % of NFPCM with 0.6 wt. % of GNP for the bath temperature of -9 ºC and -12 ºC respectively.