An overview of fundamental studies and applications of phase change material slurries to secondary loop refrigeration and air conditioning systems

Abstract

Phase change material slurries (PCS) can be employed in the refrigeration and air conditioning systems as both secondary refrigerant and cold energy storage media simultaneously, which benefits not only the system efficiency improvement by the high cold carry capacity but also the reduction of the environment-negative-impact gas emission. This paper reviews the previous researches and developments on the applications of PCS, including ice slurry, microencapsulated phase change material slurry (MPCS) as well as clathrate hydrate slurry (CHS), to the secondary loop refrigeration and air conditioning systems. The paper mainly focuses on the generation approaches and storage strategies of these slurries which are considered as the most important issues relevant to the application of PCS, while the flow and heat transfer characteristics of PCS in both tubes and heat exchangers are also summarized. Moreover, several application cases of PCS and the corresponding operation performances are presented.