MXene-decorated bio-based porous carbon composite phase change material for superior solar-thermal energy storage and thermal management of electronic components

Abstract

Energy storage technology based on phase change materials (PCM) can effectively solve the problem of poor energy utilization. However, PCM suffer from problems such as low thermal conductivity and easy leakage, which seriously hinder their application in fields such as thermal energy storage. To solve the above issues, this research prepared a series of novel composite PCM by immersing polyethylene glycol (PEG) into MXene-wrapped wood-based porous carbon support materials through a simple vacuum impregnation method. Specially, the balsa wood-derived porous carbon has excellent skeletal structure and hydrophilicity under 1000 °C carbonization temperature and delignification treatment. Further, the effect of MXene content on the properties of the composite PCM was systematically investigated. It was shown that the composite PCM (PDM-20) made within 20 mg/mL MXene dispersion had the best overall performance, with a significant increase in thermal conductivity up to 0.69 W m−1 K−1, the enthalpy efficiency and relative enthalpy efficiency values of 96.8 %/103.0 %, respectively, while the photo-thermal conversion efficiency reaching 90.1 %, which was much higher than that of the unmodified composite PCM. In addition, PDM-20 provided a remarkable delayed effect on the heating and cooling of electronic components. Therefore, PDM-20 prepared in this study has broad application prospects in heat storage, solar thermal absorption and heat management of electronic devices. Meanwhile, it also offers a new idea for the development and fabrication of green and environmentally friendly composite PCM.