Crossed analysis by T-history and Turbiscan for the characterization of PCM with Glauber salt

Abstract

The Glauber salt (sodium sulfate decahydrate) is a low-cost Phase Change Material (PCM) with promising characteristics. It offers economic and environmental advantages since it can be recovered as a waste product from the lead battery disposal. However, sub-cooling and phase segregation problems [1] require the addition of appropriate additives capable to reduce the melting temperatures as well as the latent heat [2]. These mixtures are dispersions, heterogeneous systems, for which the T-history method [3] seems to be more suitable respect to the traditional DSC, due to the major and more significant sampling. On the other hand, these systems are not thermodynamically stable and need more detailed information on the kinetics of destabilization. With this aim, the authors propose the analysis by using Turbiscan, an instrument commonly used in the pharmaceutical and cosmetic sector since it allows identification of slow and not visible phenomena that precede the dispersion destabilization [4]. Also the integration of the characterization by this method could provide further information on the effectiveness of the additives addition and on the method of samples preparation.