The Effects of Thickness and Location of PCMon the Building’s Passive Temperature-Control–A Numerical Study

Building energy consumption and building carbon emissions both account for more than 20%of their total national values in China.Building employing phase change material(PCM)for passive temperature control shows a promising prospect in meeting the comfort demand and reducing energy consumption simultaneously.However,there is a lack of more detailed research on the interaction between the location and thickness of PCM and indoor natural convection,as well as indoor temperature distribution.In this study,the numerical model of a passive temperature-controlled building integrating the developed PCM module is established with the help of ANSYS.In which,the actual weather condition of Beijing city is set as the boundary conditions and the indoor natural convection is simulated with the consideration of radiation model.The effects of PCM’s thickness and location on the internal temperature field are analyzed and discussed.The results show that the room could maintain within the human comfort temperature range with the longest ratio of 94.10%and the shortest ratio of 51.04%as integrating PCM.In comparison,the value is only 26.70%without PCM.The room’s maximum temperature fluctuation can also be improved;it could be lowered by 64.4%compared to the normal condition.When the quantity of PCM is sufficient,further increasing the PCM amount results in a temperature fluctuation reduction of less than 0.1°C and does not increase the comfort time.Placing PCM on the wall induces an apparent variation in indoor temperature along the vertical direction.Conversely,placing PCM on the roof can lead to a heat transfer rate difference of up to seven times.The optimal placement of PCM depends on the difference between the environmental and phase change temperatures.If the difference is positive,placing PCM on the roof is more effective;conversely,the opposite holds.According to the results over the entire cycle,PCM application on vertical walls yields better performance.The significant difference in natural convection caused by the same thickness of PCM but different application positions,coupled with the influence of air movement on the melting and solidification of PCM,further impacts indoor temperature fluctuations and comfort.This study can provide guidance for the application location and thickness of PCM,especially for scenarios where temperature regulation is required at a specific time.

Brightness temperature simulation of subarctic lake-ice evolution by HIGHTSI and SMRT model

Microwave brightness temperature(TB)can be used to retrieve lake ice thickness in the Arctic and subarctic regions.However,the accuracy of the retrieval is affected by the physical properties of lake ice.To improve the understanding of how lake ice affects TB,numerical modeling was applied.This study combined a physical thermodynamic ice model HIGHTSI with a microwave radiation transfer model SMRT to simulate the TB and lake ice evolution in 2002-2011 in Hulun Lake,China.The reanalyzed meteorological data were used as atmospheric forcing.The ice season was divided into the growth period,the slow growth period,and the ablation period.The simulations revealed that TB was highly sensitive to ice thickness during the ice season,especially vertical polarization measurement at 18.7 GHz.The quadratic polynomial fit for ice thickness to TB outperformed the linear fit,regardless of whether lake ice contained bubbles or not.A comparison of the simulated TB with space-borne TB showed that the simulated TB had the best accuracy during the slow growth period,with a minimum RMSE of 4.6 K.The results were influenced by the bubble radius and salinity.These findings enhance comprehension of the interaction between lake ice properties(including ice thickness,bubbles,and salinity)and TB during ice seasons,offering insights to sea ice in the Arctic and subarctic freshwater observations.

Temperature effect on the corrosion and passivation characterization of Ni_(82.3)Cr_7Fe_3Si_(4.5)B_(3.2) alloy in acidic media

The effects of temperature on corrosion and the electrochemical behavior of Ni82.3Cr7Fe3Si4.5B3.2 glassy alloy in HC1,H2SO4,and H3PO4 acids were studied using AC and DC techniques.Impedance data reveal that the susceptibility to localized corrosion increases with increasing temperature.Potentiodynamic polarization curves reveal that the bulk glassy alloy is spontaneously passivated at all the investigated temperature in H2SO4 and H3PO4 solutions.A localized corrosion effect in HCl solution is clearly observed.The apparent activation energies in the regions of Tafel,active,and passive,as well as the enthalpies and entropies of the dissolution process were determined and discussed.The high apparent activation energy（Ea） value for H3PO4 solution in Tafel region is explained by the low aggressivity of PO4^3- ions.

A passive temperature regulator

Maintaining stable temperatures is crucial for civilization,but it typically requires substantial energy consumption,contributing to significant carbon footprints.Despite advancements in passive heating/cooling technologies,achieving purely passive temperature regulation in volatile environments remains a challenge due to the temporal mismatch between heating/cooling demand and passive power supply.Here,we demonstrate a passive temperature regulator that balances the power demand and supply through a tailored sandwich structure,integrating the functionalities of harvesting,storage,and release of passive solar heat and space coldness.Outdoor experiments demonstrate that the regulator maintains a target temperature for 96%(71%)of the testing period in winter(summer).Compared to conventional solar absorbers(radiative coolers),the regulator saves 56%(30%)of energy across 31 cities worldwide in achieving stable temperatures.The regulator represents an important advancement in passive temperature regulation with minimized carbon footprint and shows attractive prospects both on Earth and in outer space.

Development of a surface acoustic wave wireless and passive temperature sensor incorporating reflective delay line

based on optimal design on the core element of the sensor,a wireless and passive surface acoustic wave（SAW）temperature sensor integrated with ID Tag was presented.A reflective delay line,which consists of a transducer and eight reflectors on YZ LiNbO3 substrate.Was fabricated as the sensor element,in which,three reflectors were used for temperature sensing,and the other five were for the ID Tag using phase encoding.Single phase unidirectional transducers（SPUDTs）and shorted grating were used to structure the sAW device,leading to excellent signal to noise ratio（SNR）.The performance of the SAW device was simulated by the coupling of modes（COM）prior to fabrication.Using the network analyzer,the response in time domain of the fabricated 434 MHz SAW sensor was characterized,the measured S11 agrees well with the simulated one,sharp reflection peaks,high signal/noise,and low spurious noise between the reflection peaks were observed.Using the radar system based on FSCW as the reader unit.the developed SAW temperature sensors were evaluated wirelessly.Excellent1 inearity and good resolution of士1℃ were observed.