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A review on thermal energy storage systems in solar air heaters
Author(s) -
Haldorai Sivarathinamoorthy,
Gurusamy Sureshkannan,
Pradhapraj Maruthaiyan
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
international journal of energy research
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.808
H-Index - 95
eISSN - 1099-114X
pISSN - 0363-907X
DOI - 10.1002/er.4379
Subject(s) - thermal energy storage , process engineering , solar energy , energy storage , renewable energy , photovoltaic thermal hybrid solar collector , environmental science , storage heater , phase change material , thermal , renewable heat , solar air conditioning , passive solar building design , nuclear engineering , meteorology , mechanical engineering , engineering , waste heat , electrical engineering , heat exchanger , thermodynamics , hybrid heat , heat pump , physics , power (physics)
Summary The drying needs of agricultural, industrial process heat requirements and for space heating, solar energy is one of the prime sources which is renewable and pollution free. As the solar energy is inconsistent and nature dependent, more often there is a mismatch between the solar thermal energy availability and requirement. This drawback could be addressed to an extent with the help of thermal energy storage systems combined with solar air heaters. This review article focuses on solar air heaters with integrated and separate thermal energy storage systems as well as greenhouses with thermal storage units. A comprehensive study was carried out in solar thermal storage units consisting of sensible heat storage materials and latent heat storage materials. As the phase change heat storage materials offer many advantages over the sensible heat storage materials, the researchers are more interested in this system. The charging and discharging characteristics of thermal storage materials with various operational parameters have been reported. All the possible solar air heater applications with storage units have also been discussed.