Thermal conductivity of solid paraffins and several n-docosane compounds with graphite

Abstract

The technical importance of paraffins as phase change materials (PCM) in heat storage systems increases. Knowledge on the thermal conductivity of paraffins is necessary for the design and optimization of heat storage systems. However, for most paraffins solely the thermal conductivity of the liquid state has been sufficiently investigated. For the solid state, precise thermal conductivity data are only known for a few paraffins, while only generalized values are available for the remainder, some of which contradict each other. In this study, a measurement setup based on the modified guarded hot plate method is developed. It is used to investigate the thermal conductivity of several paraffines in the solid state, including pure n-docosane and its compounds with different types and concentrations of graphite. For n-docosane in the solid state, the thermal conductivity is determined to be 0.49 W m−1 K−1. A particle size of 200 μm with a spherical shape turns out to be optimal to increase the thermal conductivity. This allows the thermal conductivity of a compound with 10% graphite to increase by a factor of three compared to the pure paraffin. Furthermore, significant differences to thermal conductivity data from the literature are found.