Improvement of the thermal capacity of paraffin by adding silica doped with graphite and carbon black nanoparticles

Holguino Huarza A.; Quiñonez Choquecota J.; Flores Condori A.; Román Salinas V. · Proceedings of the LACCEI international Multi-conference for Engineering, Education and Technology (2025) · DOI: 10.18687/laccei2025.1.1.946

Resumen

This research work seeks to identify materials with high heat storage capacity, with the objective of developing heat accumulator systems that can efficiently supply heat for different applications; since conventional energy sources are increasingly limited. In South America, solar radiation is an abundant and free source of energy that can be harnessed by storing heat in accumulator materials, such as phase change materials. These materials can improve their heat accumulation capacity by incorporating high thermal conductivity nanomaterials, which facilitate heat transfer, and absorbent and homogenizing nanomaterials that improve energy absorption and the chemical stability of the composite material. In this research, paraffin was used as a phase change material, silica gel as an absorbent, and graphite and carbon black as high thermal conductivity materials. The results obtained were: the composite material with graphite showed an increase of 20.04%; While the composite material with Carbon Black showed a 30.97% increase in latent heat of fusion storage compared to pure paraffin. These results suggest that the addition of graphite and Carbon Black to paraffin can significantly improve the latent heat of fusion storage capacity, which could have practical applications in thermal energy storage systems.

Instituciones: Universidad Nacional del Altiplano