This work aims to characterize phase change materials (PCM) for thermal energy storage in buildings (thermal comfort). Fatty acids, biobased organic PCM, are attractive candidates for integration into active or passive storage systems for targeted application. Three pure fatty acids (capric, myristic and palmitic acids) and two eutectic mixtures (capric-myristic and capric-palmitic acids) are studied in this paper. Although the main storage properties of pure fatty acids have already been investigated and reported in the literature, the information available on the eutectic mixtures is very limited (only melting temperature and enthalpy). This paper presents a complete experimental characterization of these pure and mixed fatty acids, including measurements of their main thermophysical properties (melting temperature and enthalpy, specific heats and densities in solid and liquid states, thermal conductivity, thermal diffusivity as well as viscosity) and the properties of interest regarding the system integrating the PCM (energy density, volume expansion). The storage performances of the studied mixtures are also compared to those of most commonly used PCM (salt hydrates and paraffins).

The present work explores the feasibility of using polyalcohols with solid-solid phase transition as active supporting matrix of n-alkanes in shape-stabilized phase change materials (SSPCMs). It is well-established that the use of SSPCM avoids leakage and increases stability and easy handling of solid-liquid PCMs. Nevertheless, the resulting composite exhibits a loss of heat storage capacity due to the volume occupied by the supporting material, which does not contribute to latent heat storage. Therefore, the objective of this work is to combine solid-liquid PCMs (alkanes) with solid-solid PCMs (polyalcohols), both exhibiting a phase transition in the same range of temperature, to obtain high energy density SSPCMs. Towards that goal, the performance of Neopentyl Glycol (NPG) and Docosane as a new energetic SSPCM has been proved. The NPG-Docosane chemical compatibility and its outstanding wettability facilitate the propitious association of both materials. The higher capillary forces obtained by decreasing the NPG crystal size together with the addition of expanded graphite (EG) allowed to obtain a maximum Docosane content of 60 wt%. The addition of EG improves the shape stability at the time that increases the heat transfer properties of the composites. The analysis showed that the components of the obtained SSPCMs are able to combine their latent heats, achieving a maximum value of 210.74 J/g for the highest Docosane content. This value is much higher than those latent heats exhibited by existing SSPCMs in the same working temperature range.