Exergy based performance evaluation of latent heat thermal storage system: A review

Phase change material (PCM) based latent heat thermal storage (LHTS) systems provide an attractive solution to bridge the gap between energy source and demand, if source is intermittent and time dependent. The optimization of LHTS systems is not necessarily on the basis of performance study through energy analysis, but on the basis of exergy based performance study. The exergy based performance evaluation and subsequent optimization of LHTS units have been a growing interest among the researchers in recent years. This can be seen through the various works reported in the literature. This paper reviews the various procedures adopted for the exergy based performance evaluation of LHTS units. The influence of operating and design parameters on the exergy stored/retrieved and thus, on the optimization is addressed as a main aspect. The need of exergy analysis for the comparative evaluation of LHTS systems with performance enhancement techniques is emphasized. Thermoeconomics methods applicable to LHTS systems are also presented in this paper. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.