International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 138 (2019) 667–676

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International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijhmt

Solidification performance of a latent heat storage unit with innovative

longitudinal triangular fins
Shuai Liu, Hao Peng ⇑, Zhiwei Hu, Xiang Ling, Jie Huang
Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Process Enhancement and New Energy Equipment Technology, School of Mechanical and Power Engineering, Nanjing Tech University, No. 30 Pu Zhu
South Road, Nanjing 211816, PR China

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: In this paper, an innovative longitudinal triangular fin was proposed to improve the solidification perfor-
Received 13 February 2019 mance of shell and tube latent heat thermal energy storage (LHTES) device. At first, the solidification
Received in revised form 18 April 2019 behaviors (solid fraction, temperature distribution and solidification time) of two different layouts of
Accepted 22 April 2019
innovative fins (Fin-B, Fin-C) were compared with the traditional rectangular fin (Fin-A). Then, the
dynamic temperature response of the fins with superior performance were analyzed. In addition, the
influences of the fin geometrical parameters, initial temperature and fin materials on the solidification
Keywords:
performance were studied and discussed. The results showed that the innovative longitudinal triangular
Phase change materials
Thermal energy storage
fins can significantly improve the solidification performance of PCM in LHTES, and the Fin-C had better
Longitudinal triangular fins heat transfer efficiency and superior solidification performance among the three types of fins. The solid-
Solidification performance ification time of Fin-C-Ⅰ decreased 38.30% significantly compared with the traditional rectangular Fin-A.
Solid fraction Generally, the solidification time decreased by decreasing the initial temperature, or increasing the ther-
mal conductivity and the fin heights. However, the effect of the bottom width of triangular fin on the
solidification performance can be neglected. To achieve a faster cooling rate, the recommended temper-
ature difference between the inner wall and PCM was over 20 K.
Ó 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction improve the thermal performances of LHTES systems. The adoption

The depletion of fossil energy and the deteriorating environ-
ment have become long-term and major bottlenecks restricting
global economic and social development. As a kind of clean energy
that can concentrate on large-scale power generation, solar ther-
mal power generation has set off a new wave of research and
development around the world [1]. However, the intermittent
and instability is the main drawback of solar thermal power gener-
ation. The latent heat thermal energy storage (LHTES) system using
phase change materials (PCMs) is one of the most effective tech-
niques to relieve the imbalance between energy supply and
demand of solar thermal power generation [2–4]. However, the
PCMs loaded in LHTES system have low thermal conductivity
(k
0.2 W/(m K)), which significantly reduces the thermal perfor-
mance of these systems [5,6]. Therefore, the methods for heat
transfer enhancement in the LHTES systems have become a hot
topic in recent years.
The use of porous matrix, and extended surface of fins were the
mainly methods which adopted by the global researchers to
⇑ Corresponding author.
E-mail address: phsight1@hotmail.com (H. Peng).
of porous metal skeleton in PCM enables the PCM to obtain excel-
lent thermal conductivity, mechanical strength, chemical stability
and flame resistance [7]. It was proven that the phase change rate
and the evolution of melting or the solidification fronts can be
accelerated by adding highly conductive materials [8]. Esapour
et al. [9] studied the effects of inner tubes number, their arrange-
ment as well as metallic foam porosity on thermal characteristics
of heat storage unit. It was found that the melting rate of the four
inner tubes was the highest for all porosity of the metal foam.
Mahdi et al. [10] described a new approach for heat-transfer
enhancement in PCM-based shell-and-tube thermal energy storage
systems by employing multiple-segment or cascaded metal foam.
The results showed that the foam cascade in PCM/ metal foam
composites can significantly shorten the energy storage and recov-
ery time. Saedodin et al. [11] investigated the effect of porous
metal foam on the performance of a flat-plate solar collector, and
obtained the optimum thickness of the porous medium. They
pointed out that the highly conductive materials embedded in
the PCMs can improve the thermal conductivity of PCMs to some
extent. The thermal performance enhancement of PCMs would
allow the LHTES system to be more widely used in the fields of
solar energy systems, electricity peak-shaving, building energy

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijheatmasstransfer.2019.04.121
0017-9310/Ó 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
668 S. Liu et al. / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 138 (2019) 667–676
Nomenclature
LHTES latent heat thermal energy storage
PCM phase change material
cp specific heat [J/(kg K)]
H1,H2,H3 heights of innovative triangular Fin-B and Fin-C [mm]
L enthalpy [J/g]
I length of the fin [mm]
Ro diameter of the external shell [mm]
Ri diameter of the inner pipe [mm]
S source term
P1,P2,P3 pitches of innovative triangular Fin-B and Fin-C [mm]
T temperature [K]
t time [s]
!
v velocity vector
Wr width of rectangular Fin-A [mm]
Wt bottom width of innovative triangular Fin-B and Fin-C
[mm]
conservation systems, and industrial waste heat utilization
[12–14].
In addition, the use of extended fins is one of the simple and
effective approaches for enhancing the heat transfer between
PCM and HTF in an energy storage unit. The extended fins have
the benefits of ease of installation and require less maintenance
during operation. Abdulateef et al. [15] summarized the majority
of heat-transfer enhancement strategies between the heat transfer
fluid (HTF) and the PCM based on the application of fins embedded
in the PCM in LHTES systems. They highlighted that best enhance-
ment was achieved using the longitudinal finned configurations,
especially along circumference of the cylindrical. Sciacovelli et al.
[16] presented the tree shaped fins for the improvement of a
shell-and-tube LHTES system. The geometry of fins was optimized
through combined CFD model and response surface method. They
found that the system efficiency can be promoted by 24% after
optimization. Mahdi et al. [17] studied the influences of internal
longitudinal fins dimensions and nanoparticles volume concentra-
tions on PCM solidification performances. The results showed that
the solidification time of PCM was obviously shortened. Abdulateef
et al. [5,18] investigated the both melting and solidification pro-
cesses of PCM in LHTES system by using internal, internal-
external, and external triangular fins, and found that the external
triangular finned tube was the most efficient for the brief melting/
solidification of PCM. Rozenfeld et al. [19] presented a double-pipe
heat storage unit with a helical fin attached to the inner tube,
numerical simulation and experiments were carried out to reveal
the effects of various governing parameters. A number of advan-
tages, such as enhanced melting, prevention of increased pressures
in melting and voids in solidification, and highly-convenient han-
dling and maintenance, were found in comparison with the exist-
ing fin-array systems. Jia [20] found that the insertion of pin fins
into a spherical PCM capsule can improve the cold charging rate
significantly. Baby and Balaji [21,22] conducted the experimental
studies on the thermal performance of different configurations of
PCM based pin fin heat sinks, and found that the operational per-
formance of portable electronic device can be effectively improved
by using pin fins. Ali et al. [23–26] analyzed the thermal perfor-
mance of several groups of circular fins with different geometrical
sizes in the radiator. The results indicated that 3 mm diameter of
circular pin-fins has the best thermal performance. Hosseinzadeh
[27] studied the solidification process of hybrid nanoenhanced
Phase Change Material (HNEPCM) in a LHTES system enhanced in
Greek symbols
b thermal-expansion coefficient
h liquid fraction
k thermal conductivity [W/(m K)]
q density [kg/m3]
X interface between fin and PCM
Subscripts
0 initial value
i inner pipe
l liquid
lh latent heat
m material
ref reference
s solid
se sensible
sm solidification/melting
the presence of tree-like branching fins. The results showed that
the average temperature and total energy of the system decreased
by increasing the fin bifurcation angle. Pizzolato [28] presented a
topology optimization framework of a LHTES system with tree-
shaped fins, and this method had certain guiding significance for
the practical design of LHTES system.
As mentioned above, a lot of remarkable achievements on ther-
mal energy storage enhancement by using different types of fins
were presented. These fins also had proved quite successfully in
the practical industrial applications. However, there was still much
space for the TES system improvement by continually proposing
various kinds of innovative fins. Therefore, as a useful complement
for the previous fruitful works, an innovative longitudinal triangu-
lar fin was proposed for the thermal energy storage enhancement
in a LHTES system. At first, the solidification behaviors of the inno-
vative fins were studied using the Li2CO3-K2CO3-Na2CO3 (32-35-
33 wt%) ternary hybrid molten salt as the PCM. Then, the dynamic
temperature response of the fins was analyzed. Finally, the influ-
ences of the fin geometrical parameters, initial temperature and
fin materials on the solidification performance were studied and
discussed.
2. Physical model and numerical methods
2.1. Innovative longitudinal triangular fin configuration
Three types of fins were considered in the present work: Fin-A
(traditional rectangular fin), innovative longitudinal triangular Fin-
B and Fin-C, as shown in Fig. 1. The innovative longitudinal trian-
gular fins (Fin-B and Fin-C) were composed by one longitudinal
rectangular fin and three couples of triangular fins with different
heights, as shown in Fig. 1(b) and (c). The mainly geometric param-
eters of the innovative longitudinal triangular fins were: the width
(Wr) and length (I) of longitudinal rectangular fins, the pitches (P1,
P2, P3), bottom width (Wt) and height (H1, H2, H3) of triangular fins.
Based on the different height of triangular fins, the innovative lon-
gitudinal triangular fins were divided into: Fin-B with ever-
increasing height (H); Fin-C with ever-decreasing height (H). The
geometric dimensions of fins studied in this paper were shown
in Table 1.
The schematic diagram of shell-and-tube LHTES unit was
shown in Fig. 2. The pipe material was aluminum and the phase
change material was ternary hybrid molten salt (see Fig. 2(b)). A
 S. Liu et al. / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 138 (2019) 667–676 669

H3
P3

H2 P2
I
Wt
H1
P1
Wr

(a)Fin-A traditional (b)Fin-B, ever-increasing (c)Fin-C, ever-decreasing

rectangular fins height (H1< H2<H3) height (H1> H2> H3)

Fig. 1. Traditional and innovative longitudinal triangular fin configurations.

Table 1
The geometric dimensions of fins.

Cases Wr/mm I/mm Wt/mm P1/mm P2/mm P3/mm H1/mm H2/mm H3/mm
Fin-A 1.0 23.0 – – – – – – –
Fin-B 1.0 23.0 2.0 10.0 7.0 4.0 6.0 8.0 10.0
Fin-C I 1.0 23.0 2.0 10.0 7.0 4.0 10.0 8.0 6.0
II 1.0 23.0 2.5 10.0 7.0 4.0 10.0 8.0 6.0
III 1.0 23.0 3.0 10.0 7.0 4.0 10.0 8.0 6.0
IV 1.0 23.0 2.0 10.0 7.0 4.0 12.0 10.0 8.0
V 1.0 23.0 2.0 10.0 7.0 4.0 14.0 12.0 10.0

two-dimensional transient heat transfer model considering the
liquid-solid phase change of ternary hybrid molten salt was devel-
oped to investigate the solidification performance of the LHTES
with innovative longitudinal triangular fins. The cold fluid flowed
through the inner pipe while the PCM fills in the external wall. A
unit of the latent heat energy storage system was selected for
numerical simulation. This unit consisted of an inner tube, an
external wall, and the innovative longitudinal triangular fins
between the inner tube and the external wall. The diameter of
the inner pipe (Ri) was 10 mm, the diameter of the external wall
(Ro) was 35 mm. Since the solidification process of PCM was the
main concern in the simulations, the initial temperature of PCM
was a little bit higher than the melting point. The thermal conduc-
tivity (k), specific heat capacity (cp), and density (q) of aluminum
and molten slag, as well as the latent heat (Llh) and phase transition
temperature (Tsm) of molten slag were listed in Table 2 [29].
2.2. Governing equations
For the numerical analysis of the thermal process, some
assumptions are made as follows:
(1) The phase-change process is considered to be unsteady-
state.
(2) The contact thermal resistance between the ternary hybrid
molten salt and aluminum fins is negligible;
(3) The phase transition occurs at a small temperature interval
Tsm between Tsm  DT/2 and Tsm + DT/2, where DT = 4 K [29];
(4) The heat loss from the PCM to its surroundings is negligible.
(5) The solidification process of PCM is dominated by heat con-
duction [30] and natural convection occurs only at the
beginning of the solidification process. Hence, buoyancy
can be neglected as mentioned by [16,30].

External shell Ro

Adiabatic
Ri

Inner piper Ti

Innovative
triangular fin

Fin
Molten salt

(a) (b)
Fig. 2. Schematic diagram of LHTES unit.
670 S. Liu et al. / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 138 (2019) 667–676

Table 2
Physical properties of Li2CO3-K2CO3-Na2CO3 and aluminum [29].

Material Tsm/K Llh/(kJ/kg) k/W/(m K) cp/J/(kg K) q/kg/m3

Li2CO3-K2CO3-Na2CO3 668 273.0 1.69 (solid) 1540 (623 K) 2310
1.60 (liquid) 1640 (723 K)
Aluminum – – 202.4 871 2719

In this paper, a simplified two-dimensional transient heat trans- Partial Grid

fer model with a constant temperature for the inner pipe wall is
established. Therefore, only the energy equation is expressed.
The energy equation:
@ !
ðqLÞ þ r  ðq v LÞ ¼ r  ðkrTÞ þ S ð1Þ
@t
Since the fluid velocity in energy Eq. (1) is zero and no source
term in the present work. Eq. (1) can be simplified as: Fin-A
@
ðqLÞ ¼ r  ðkrTÞ ð2Þ
@t Partial Grid

L ¼ Lse þ Llh ð3Þ

where
Z T
Lse ¼ Lref þ cp dT ð4Þ
T ref

The latent heat content can be written in terms of the latent Fin-B
heat of the material, Lm:
Llh ¼ hLm ð5Þ Partial Grid
The liquid fraction, h, can be defined as
h¼0 if T < T s
h¼1 if T > T l ð6Þ
h ¼ TTT s
T s
if T s < T < T l
l

2.3. Grid
Fin-C
Quadrilateral mesh is used to discretize the computing domains Fig. 3. Mesh of computational model.
by ICEM, as shown in Fig. 3. The mesh consists of two regions. The
area of fin surfaces is discretized by fine mesh due to the large tem-
perature gradients in this region. The second region is the annular On the interface between ternary hybrid molten salt and solid
area between the inner tube and the external wall, consists of a fins, the matching temperature and heat flux boundary conditions
coarse mesh due to the relatively uniform PCM in those areas. Grid were given below.
independence analysis is essential, which is performed for the case
Fin-C-I (illustrated in Table 1). Four different mesh numbers are T s;X ¼ T i;X ð9Þ
used to study the effect of mesh density on the numerical results.
   
The results are shown in Section 3.1. @T s @T l
ks jX ¼ kl jX ð10Þ
@n @b
2.4. Initial and boundary conditions

As mentioned in Section 2.1, the initial temperature of PCM was
a little bit higher than the melting point (Tsm = 668 K). Therefore,
the initial temperature of T0 = 678 K was set up in the whole com-
putational domain, and the liquid-phase fraction (h) equals to 1.
The internal wall of the inner pipe was regarded as a constant wall
temperature boundary (Ti), the external wall was treated as an adi-
abatic wall boundary condition.
Initial condition:
Tjt¼0 ¼ T 0 ¼ 678K
Boundary conditions:
T i ¼ constant
2.5. Numerical approach
The Solidification/Melting model in Ansys Fluent 16.0 was
adopted in the present work. The time step was variable: the time
step was 0.01 s in the first 100 s, and the time step after 100 s was
0.05 s in order to save computational time. The SIMPLE pressure-
velocity coupling algorithm and coupled heat transfer were
adopted to solve the energy equation. The second-order upwind
scheme was used for energy equations, and the compressive
ð7Þ
scheme was used for volume fraction. The temperature of PCM
was patched as 678 K at the beginning of the simulation. The con-
vergence criterion was that the residual values of the energy equa-
ð8Þ tion were less than 106.
 S. Liu et al. / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 138 (2019) 667–676 671

3. Grid independence and model verification
3.1. Independent analysis for grid number and time step
In this paper, the analyses of grid and time step independence
were performed for the case Fin-C-I. Four different grid numbers
(n = 229899, n = 326645, n = 430552, n = 512409), four different
time steps (0.01 s, 0.02 s, 0.05 s and 0.1 s) were used to study the
effect of mesh density and time step on numerical results. Fig. 4
depicted the solidification time of Fin-C-I with different grid num-
ber and time step. In this figure, when the grid number was
increasing from 326,645 to 430552, and the time step was decreas-
ing from 0.05 s to 0.02 s, the relative errors of solidification time
were less than 1.0%. Therefore, the grid number of about 300,000
was selected in the subsequent simulation. However, in order to
get more accurate results, the time step was 0.01 s in the first
100 s of the iteration, when the time reached 100 s, the time step
of 0.05 s was adopted to save the computational time.
3.2. Model verification
The experimental results from Ismail et al. [31] were used here
to validate the present numerical model. In their work, the effects
of finned number on the solidification time and the solidification
mass fraction of the PCM were studied by experiments. Results
showed that a metallic tube fitted with four fins of constant thick-
ness equal to the tube wall thickness can significantly shorten the
solidification time of PCM. Accordingly, the present numerical
model was verified by choosing a typical case (the fin number
was 4) in Ismail et al.’s work, and the corresponding physical prop-
erties were shown in Table 3.
Fig. 5 compared the experimental positions of the solidification
front with the numerical predictions of the present CFD model. The
comparison showed a good agreement between experiments and
numerical results. The maximum error was 9.4% when the solidifi-
cation time was 30 min. This deviation was caused by the change
of thermal conductivity of PCM during solidification. Since the
average deviation shown in Fig. 5 was small, the numerical results
were acceptable. This was indicated that the CFD model can be
confidently used for the numerical simulation presented in the fol-
lowing sections.
4. Results and discussion
4.1. Solidification behaviors
The evolution of the solid fraction and temperature distribution
of the LHTES with different type innovative longitudinal triangular
fins (Fin-A, Fin-B and Fin-C-I) were illustrated in Table 4.
It was obviously that the solid fraction distribution was closely
related to the geometric shape of fins. At the early stage of solidi-
fication, the solid-phase of PCM extended continuously with the
geometric contour of the fins. This was due to the high thermal
conductivity of the fins, thus making the PCM around the fins
solidified faster than the other regions. However, as the time went
on, the solid layer thickness of the PCM increased, the relevant
direct-contact heat transfer between the high-conductivity fin
and the PCM was weaken. At this stage, the solidification process
primarily depended on the heat conduction between solid PCM
and liquid PCM, and hence, the solidification rate became slow.
In addition, it was clear that the evolution of the solid fraction of
the Fin-B and Fin-C-I were much faster than that of the Fin-A,
which indicated that Fin-B and Fin-C-I can significantly improve
the solidification rate of PCM in the LHTES system. Further compar-
ing the Fin-B with the Fin-C-I, it was worth mentioning that the
cross-sectional area and perimeter of the Fin-B and the Fin-C-I
were the same, except for the layouts of the fins (see Fig. 1). How-
ever, the PCM solid region of Fin-C-I was slightly larger than that of
the Fin-B at the same time, representing the Fin-C had a faster
solidification rate than the Fin-B. This phenomenon was obvious
at the solidification time from 100 s to 500 s. The reason was elab-
orated in the next Section 4.2 based on the dynamic temperature
analysis.

1060 1040 Ti=636 K

1050 Ti=636 K
1030 Fin-C-I
solidificaon me(s)

1040 =202.4 W/(m K)

Solidificaon me(s)

1030 1020
1020 Grid number used in this work Time step used in this work
1010
1010
1000 1000

990
990
980
225000 300000 375000 450000 525000 0.00 0.02 0.04 0.06 0.08 0.10
Grid number Time step (s)
Fig. 4. Grid and time step independence analysis.

Table 3
Physical properties and operational conditions for simulation based on Ismail et al. [31].

Material Tsm/K Llh/(kJ/kg) k/W/(m K) cp/J/(kg K) q/kg/m3

Paraffin (PCM) 329 232.4 0.089 (solid) 2176 (solid) 771.2 (solid)
0.089 (liquid) 2176 (liquid) 771.2 (liquid)
672 S. Liu et al. / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 138 (2019) 667–676

0.018 did not occur in the solid fraction evolution curves of Fin-A. These
CFD-30min
phenomena can be attributed to the innovative longitudinal trian-
0.016 Exp-30min gular fins structures. The liquid-solid phase change processes were
0.014 CFD-60min strengthened by the extended heat transfer surfaces of the Fin-B
Exp-60min and Fin-C-I, and the strengthening effect was significant in the first
0.012 CFD-90min 500 s during the solidification. Therefore, the solid fraction curves
0.010 Exp-90min presented a steeper slope at the beginning. However, when the
Y(m)

time exceeded 500 s, a slight slope of the solid fraction curves

0.008
0.006
0.004
0.002
0.000
0.000 0.003 0.006 0.009 0.012 0.015 0.018
X(m)
Fig. 5. Numerical vs. experimental positions of the solidification front [31].
The temperature distribution was shown on the right side of
Table 4, and the shape of the temperature distribution corre-
sponded to the evolution of the solid fraction. Owing to its relative
lesser heat transfer area, the temperature gradient of the Fin-A, as
well as the temperature influencing area, were smaller than that of
Fin-B and Fin-C-I during each solidification period. For Fin-B and
Fin-C-I, although the heat transfer areas were the same, the differ-
ence in temperature distribution was observed due to the different
layouts. Apparently, in near the cold wall region, the Fin-C-I layout
had more heat transfer area than the Fin-B layout, which may con-
tribute to the faster solidification rate of the PCM.
More specifically describing the phase change process of PCM in
LHTES, the solid fraction evolution of the three fin configurations
(Fin-A, Fin-B, Fin-C-I) were presented in Fig. 6(a). Obviously, the
solidification rates of the Fin-B and the Fin-C-I were almost identi-
cal, but were faster than the Fin-A. As can be seen in this figure, the
solidification rates of Fin-B and Fin-C-I were faster at the early
stage of solidification process (t < 500 s). As the time went
to 500 s, the turning points appeared and the corresponding
solidification rates were slow down. However, this turning point
was observed. This was due to the fact that, as the solid region
increased gradually, the phase-change enhancement induced by
the fins was weaken accordingly. At this stage, the solidification
process of liquid PCM was dominated by their own heat conduc-
tion, and the relative lower thermal conductivity of liquid PCM
resulted in a reduced solidification rates. For the Fin-A, the solidi-
fication rate remained nearly constant during the whole process,
which indicated that the enhancement of this fin structure was
not obvious.
In addition, the corresponding total solidification time of three
different fins were listed in Fig. 6(b). The solidification time of
Fin-B and Fin-C-I were 1990 s and 1780 s, respectively, which were
far less than the solidification time of Fin-A. The Fin-C-I had the
shortest solidification time, which decreased 38.30% compared
with the solidification time 2885 s of the Fin-A.
To quantitatively compare the differences between Fin-B and
Fin-C-I, the solidification times at different solid fractions were
listed in Table 5. As shown, when the solid fractions of PCM
reached to the values of 0.8, 0.85 and 0.9, the PCM solidification
time of Fin-C-I reduced by 15.79%, 15.03% and 11.50% compared
with the Fin-B, which indicated that the Fin-C-I had better heat
transfer efficiency and superior solidification performance. There-
fore, the following discussions in regard to the effect of geometrical
parameters were conducted based on the structure of Fin-C in
Section 4.3.
4.2. Dynamic temperature distribution
To further explore the temperature changes of PCM and fins
during solidification process, the dynamic temperature responds
of the Fin-C-I structure were studied and analyzed. Six specific
points were selected for this comparative analysis, among which

Table 4
Evolution of solid fraction and temperature distribution of LHTES with different innovative longitudinal triangular fins.
Fin-A Fin-B Fin-C- Fin-A Fin-B Fin-C-
t/s
solid fraction temperature distribution

5
Liquid Fracon T/K
0.95 670
0.90 668
0.85 666
100 0.80 664
0.75 662
0.70 660
0.65 658
0.60 656
0.55 654
300 652
0.50
650
0.45
648
0.40
646
0.35
644
0.30
500 642
0.25 640
0.20 638
0.15 636
0.10 634
0.05
700
 S. Liu et al. / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 138 (2019) 667–676 673

1.0
Turning Points 3000 2885

0.8 2500
1990
Solid fracon

0.6 2000
1780
Fin-A

t/s
Fin-B 1500
0.4
Fin-C-I
1000
0.2
500

0.0 0
0 500 1000 1500 2000 2500 3000 Fin-A Fin-B Fin-C-I
t/s Fin configuraons
(a) (b)
Fig. 6. Effect of fin configurations on solidification behaviors: (a) solid fraction evolution; (b) total solidification time.

Table 5 wall region had superior heat transfer capability than the fins at
Solidification time with different innovative longitudinal triangular fins at different the far side. And therefore, the near-wall fins with larger heat
solid fractions.
transfer surfaces can contribute to the enhancement of the solidi-
Solid fractions t/s (Fin-B) t/s (Fin-C-I) fication process. This phenomenon also can explain why the Fin-C-I
0.80 665 560 had better solidification performance than that of the Fin-B.
0.85 865 735
0.90 1130 1000
4.3. Effects of geometrical parameters and operational conditions

In this section, the effects of fin geometry, initial temperature

points 1–3 were located in the PCM, points 4–6 were located in the
fins, as shown in Fig. 7(a). The temperature distributions of these
six points versus solidification time were depicted in Fig. 7(b).
Since the thermal conductivity of the aluminum fins was much
higher than the PCM (as illustrated in Table 2), the temperatures
in the fins (points 4–6) were generally lower than that in the
PCM (point 2–3), except for the point 1. This was because the point
1 was very close to the inner cold surface, the relative shorter heat
transfer distance resulted in a faster PCM temperature drop at this
location. Moreover, both point 2 and point 3 had a constant tem-
perature stage, but the duration time of this stage were different.
The further distance away from the cold surface, the duration time
of the flat-temperature was longer. It was worth noting that the
temperatures at point 4 were obviously lower than the tempera-
tures at points 5–6 (the temperatures at point 5 and point 6 were
very close). It meant that the fins located in the vicinity of the cold
and thermal conductivity on the solidification performances were
analyzed. As mentioned above, the effects of fin geometry were
presented based on the Fin-C structure (including Wt, H1, H2, and
H3) because it had the superior solidification performance among
the three types of fins shown in Fig. 1.
4.3.1. Effect of heights of triangular fin
Fig. 8 depicted the effect of fin heights on the solidification time
of PCM. Fig. 8(a) showed the solid fraction evolution of PCM with
the different fin heights. Actually, the evolution process can be
roughly divided into two stages (the dash line in Fig. 8(a)): the
rapid solidification stage and the slow solidification stage. More
than 80% of the PCM had solidified in the first stage, only less than
20% of the PCM solidified in the second stage. Normally, the solid-
ification rate in the first stage was much higher than that in the
second stage, and the corresponding solidification time of the

6 680 1
Fin-C-I
5 2
3
670 3
4 2
4
1 660 5
T/K

6
650

640

630
Fin 0 500 1000 1500 2000 2500 3000

Molten salt t/s

(a) (b)

Fig. 7. Temperature variation at different locations of Fin-C-I during solidification.

674 S. Liu et al. / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 138 (2019) 667–676
1.0
0.8
H1=10mm,H2=8mm,H3=6mm
Solid Fracons
0.6 (Fin-C-I)
H1=12mm,H2=10mm,H3=8mm
t/s
0.4 (Fin-C-IV)
H1=14mm,H2=16mm,H3=18mm
0.2 (Fin-C-V)
First stage Second stage
0.0
0 500 1000 1500 2000
t/s
(a)
Fig. 8. Effect of heights of triangular fin on solidification behavior: (a) solid fraction evolution; (b) total solidification time.
second stage was much longer than that of the first stage. This was
because the solidification of PCM was accelerated by the strength-
ening effect of high thermal conductivity fins in the first stage. But
in the second stage, PCM solidification can only depend on their
own heat conduction, the effect of fins can be neglected, the rela-
tive lower thermal conductivity of PCM lead to a reduction of the
solidification rates.
Specifically, in the first stage, it was observed that the solidifica-
tion rates of three cases were almost identical. Owing to the
enlarged fin heat transfer surface can extend the intensified heat
transfer area as well, the solidification rate for Fin-C-V in the sec-
ond stage was a bit higher than the other two types of fins (Fin-
C-I and Fin-C-IV). From Fig. 8(b), it also can be seen that overall
solidification time of the PCM was shorten remarkably with the
increase of fin heights. The solidification time of 1325 s for the
Fin-C-V was reduced by 25.6% compared with the solidification
time of 1780 s for the Fin-C-I. The reason had been interpreted in
the above.
To conclude, as the fin heights increased, the solidification rate
increased and the solidification time decreased, which were bene-
ficial to the PCM solidification process the in the LHTES system. In
contrary, since the heat capacity of the fin was far less than the
latent heat of the PCM, the cold energy stored in the LHTES
decreased accordingly with the increase of the fin heights. There-
fore, it should exist an optimal value that balance the stored total
cold energy and the solidification time for the LHTES system, which
was worth further investigation in the future work.
4.3.2. Effect of bottom width of triangular fin
The solid fraction evolution of PCM during solidification with
the different bottom width Wt were shown in Fig. 9. As shown in
this figure, at first, the solidification rate of PCM decreased with
the increase of Wt, the solidification time was 1780 s for Wt = 2.0
mm and 1880 s for Wt = 2.5 mm, respectively. This was mainly
because the heat capacity per unit length of triangular fins would
increase with the increase of the Wt. But the heat transfer enhance-
ment by extending the heat transfer surface was lower than the
heat transfer reduction by increasing the heat capacity per unit
length. However, the solidification rate of PCM did not always
decrease by increasing the Wt. The solidification rate for Wt = 3.0
mm was obviously higher than that Wt = 2.5 mm, and the solidifi-
cation time decreased slightly from 1880 s to 1850 s accordingly.
The possible explanation can be given for this phenomenon. Gen-
erally, it had two opposite effects on the heat transfer performance
with the increase of Wt. On the one hand, with the increase of the
1780
1800
1600 1560
1400 1325
1200
1000
800
600
400
200
0
Fin-C-I Fin-C-IV Fin-C-V
Fin configuraons
(b)
Wt, the heat transfer area increased as well, which resulted in an
enhanced heat transfer between the fins and PCM; on the other
hand, the increased Wt would give rise to the increased thermal
resistance of the fin. Both the two aspects performed predomi-
nantly, the solidification rate increases indicated that the heat
transfer enhancement was significant and dominating for the Wt
in the range of 2.5–3.0 mm.
In conclusion, although the solidification rate of PCM was
decreasing at first and then increasing with the increase of Wt,
the discrepancies of the solidification time was slight. The maxi-
mum discrepancy less than 6% was calculated from Fig. 9(b), which
indicated that the effect of the Wt on the solidification performance
was not significant in the present work.
4.3.3. Effect of initial temperature of the inner wall
The initial temperature of the inner wall was an important
parameter on the solidification performance of LHTES system,
which directly determined the strength of the heat transfer driving
force. Fig. 10(a) presented the solid fraction evolution during solid-
ification for Fin-C-I structure with different initial temperature of
inner wall. It was not surprise that the larger value between the
initial temperature of the inner wall and the solidification temper-
ature of PCM, the shorter the time required for PCM solidification.
This was because the heat transfer driving force was promoted as
the temperature difference increased, thus shorten the solidifica-
tion process. As illustrated in Fig. 10(b), the solidification time
was not always increasing at the same slope, the solidification time
was increasing 114% from 1250 s to 2675 s as the inner wall tem-
perature increased from 624 K to 648 K, however, there was a
sharp increase of the solidification time from 2675 s to 6040 s
when the inner wall temperature was increasing from 648 K to
660 K. To conclude, since the PCM solidification temperature was
668 K, and therefore, to achieve a faster cooling rate, at least 20 K
temperature difference between the inner wall and PCM was rec-
ommended in the present work.
4.3.4. Effect of fin thermal conductivity
The effect of fin materials on the solidification performance of
the PCM was depicted in Fig. 11. Four types of fin materials:
stainless steel, iron, aluminum, and copper, were chosen for ana-
lyzing. The thermal conductivities of these metal material were
16.2 W/(m K), 47.0 W/(m K), 202.4 W/(m K) and 387.6 W/(m K),
respectively. As expected, the solidification time was decreasing
obviously with the increase of the thermal conductivities. As
shown in Fig. 11(b), the solidification time was 5225 s for the
 S. Liu et al. / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 138 (2019) 667–676 675

1.0 2000 1880 1850

1800 1780
0.8 1600
1400
Solid Fracons

0.6 1200

t/s
1000
0.4 Wt=2.0mm(Fin-C-I) 800
Wt=2.5mm(Fin-C-II) 600
0.2 Wt=3.0mm(Fin-C-III) 400
200
0.0 0
0 500 1000 1500 2000 2500 Fin-C-I Fin-C-II Fin-C-III
t/s Fin configuraons
(a) (b)
Fig. 9. Effect of bottom width of triangular fin on solidification behavior: (a) solid fraction evolution; (b) total solidification time.

1.0 6500
6000
0.8 Solidificaon me(s) 5500
Fin-C- 5000
Solid Fracons

4500 Fin-C-
0.6
4000
Ti=624K
3500
0.4 Ti=636K 3000
Ti=648K 2500
0.2 Ti=660K 2000
1500
0.0 1000
0 1000 2000 3000 4000 5000 6000 7000 8000 620 625 630 635 640 645 650 655 660 665
t/s inial temperature (K)
(a) (b)
Fig. 10. Effect of initial temperature of inner wall on PCM Solidification behavior: (a) solid fraction evolution with different initial temperatures; (b) solidification time with
different initial temperatures.

1.0 5500
5000
0.8 4500
Solidificaon me(s)

Fin-C-
Solid Fracons

4000
0.6 Fin-C-
3500
3000
0.4
Copper, =387.6W/(m K) 2500
Aluminum, =202.4W/(m K)
0.2 2000
Iron, =47.0W/(m K)
1500
Stainless steel, =16.2W/(m K)
0.0 1000
0 1000 2000 3000 4000 5000 6000 0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350 400
t/s Thermal conducvies(W/(m K))
(a) (b)
Fig. 11. Effect of fin thermal conductivities on PCM Solidification behavior: (a) solid fraction evolution with different fin thermal conductivities; (b) solidification time with
different fin thermal conductivities.

stainless steel fin, but it reduced  71.4% to 1494 s for the cooper were preferential in the practical application if the manufacturing
fin. Therefore, the fin materials with higher thermal conductivities technique was mature and reliable.
676 S. Liu et al. / International Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer 138 (2019) 667–676
5. Conclusions
In this paper, a novel longitudinal triangular fin structure was
proposed, and the solidification behaviors of two different layouts
of innovative fins were compared with the traditional rectangular
fin. In addition, the dynamic temperature response of the fins with
superior performance were analyzed. Furthermore, the effects of
the fin geometrical parameters and operational conditions on the
solidification performance were studied and discussed. The main
conclusions were as follows:
(1) Innovative longitudinal triangular fins can significantly
improve the solidification performance of PCM in LHTES,
and the Fin-C had better heat transfer efficiency and superior
solidification performance among the three types of fins.
This was attributed to the fact that the near-wall fins with
larger heat transfer surfaces can contribute to the enhance-
ment of the solidification process. More specifically, the
solidification time of Fin-C-I decreased 38.30% from 2885 s
to 1780 s compared with the traditional rectangular Fin-A.
(2) The fin height was a crucial influencing factor for the PCM
solidification process in the LHTES system, the solidification
time decreased evidently as the fin heights increased. How-
ever, the effect of the Wt on the solidification performance
was not significant, the maximum deviation less than 6%
of solidification time was found for different Wt.
(3) Both the initial temperature of the inner wall and the fin
thermal conductivity had significant effect on the solidifica-
tion time of PCM. Generally, the solidification time
decreased by decreasing the initial temperature or increas-
ing the thermal conductivity. The recommended tempera-
ture difference between the inner wall and PCM was over
20 K to achieve a faster cooling rate in the present work.
(4) In further studies, the geometrical optimization of the Fin-C
structure by matching the cold energy storage capacity and
the solidification time will be explored.
Conflict of interest
None.
Acknowledgements
The authors acknowledge the financial support provided by
National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No.
51776095), Major Collegiate Project of Natural Science Foundation
of Jiangsu Province (Grant No. 15KJA480001), and Young Science
Leaders Project of Jiangsu Province.
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