Potential of Coconut Oil for Temperature Regulation in Tropical Houses

Abstract

The use of a thermal mass is a well-known technology for conditioning the indoor thermal environment in tropical houses. Architects and builders generally used heavy-weight building materials, such as concrete and bricks, for walls and floors to ensure thermal comfort of rooms; however, it is difficult to make a good composition of thermal masses that can result in thermally comfortable conditions. This paper discusses the potential of coconut oils (co_oil) as an indoor thermal energy storage (TES) material for improving the thermal performance of rooms in addition to the existing thermal masses used in tropical houses in Bandung, Indonesia. Co_oil is a very promising organic phase-change material (PCM) due to its high thermal capacity storage in sensible and latent phases. In this paper, the application of co_oil for temperature regulation is considered in the light of two important aspects, such as the use of addition of a co_oil mass and the effect of room air circulation. The role of PCM in the form of co_oil as a TES material to regulate indoor air temperature is reported.