Mathematical Modelling and Simulation of Phase Change Drywalls for Heating Application in a Passive Solar Building

Integration of phase change materials (PCMs ) into building fabrics is considered to be one of the potential and effective ways of minimising energy consumption and CO2 emissions in the building sector. In order to assess the thermal effectiveness of this system, composite PCM drywall samples (i.e. randomly mixed and laminated PCM drywalls) have been evaluated in a model passive solar building. For a broader assessment, effects of three sets of phase change zones (narrow, intermediate and wide) of the PCM sample were considered. Using the Finite Difference Method (FDM), the results showed that the laminated PCM wallboard with a narrow phase change zone was more sensitive to the optimum melting temperature and was capabl e of increasing the minimum room temperature by about 17% more than the randomly-mixed type. Even though there was some display of non-isothermal phase change process, the overall results proved the laminated system to be thermally more effective in terms of evolution and utilisation of latent heat. Further heat transfer enhancement process is however required towards the development of the laminated system