Development of thermal energy storage lightweight concrete using paraffin-oil palm kernel shell-activated carbon composite

In this study, the potential application of activated carbon produced from oil palm kernel shell (OPKS) as the supporting material of paraffin to develop a form-stable composite PCM was investigated. The produced activated carbon managed to retain up to 31% of paraffin by mass. The prepared composite PCM was then characterized using scanning electron microscopy (SEM), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and thermal cyclic test. The experimental results showed that the melting and solidifying temperatures of paraffin-OPKS-activated carbon composite were 29.2 degrees C and 31.6 degrees C with a corresponding latent heat of 57.3 J/g and -57.2 J/g. Moreover, paraffin-OPKS-activated carbon composite also demonstrated good stability against thermal degradation, excellent chemical stability, stable phase change temperature with considerable latent heat and great thermal reliability. In addition, concrete incorporated with paraffin-OPKS-activated carbon composite could achieve a compressive strength up to 25 MPa at the age of 28 days. The laboratory scale thermoregulation performance test showed that concrete panels incorporated with paraffin-OPKS-activated carbon composite have a higher thermal lag and lower peak temperature during phase transition of composite PCM. (C) 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.