Improvement of Thermal Conductivity of Paraffin Wax Using High Conductive Nano-Materials

Abstract

Paraffin wax (PW) is commonly used as latent heat storage material in solar energy systems. The low thermal conductivity of the PW is considered the main drawback when it is used as thermal energy storage medium. In order to overcome this drawback, tens types of high conductive nano-materials are added to paraffin wax to improve its thermal conductivity. In this work, nanoparticles of CuO, and TiO2 were individually added to paraffin wax with concentrations 1, 2 and 3%. The thermal properties of pure paraffin wax, PW/CuO and PW/TiO2 nano-composites with different mentioned concentrations were measured at different temperature. The paraffin wax/TiO2 showed higher thermal conductivity compared to paraffin wax/CuO nano-composite and pure paraffin.