Thermal management of electronic components by using phase change composite

Abstract

The current investigative study is based on the thermal performance of a nano enhanced phase change material (NePCM) based thermal energy storage system for cooling of electronic components. The cooling technology based on NePCM filled heat sink (HS), is a passive method of cooling which can replace the cooling methods based on machinery example, fans. Copper oxide (CuO) and aluminium oxide (Al2O3) are used as nanoparticles, aluminium for HS material and paraffin wax is used as the phase change material (PCM) for the study. A constant volume fraction of 9%is considered for the fin material and different HS designs which are, heat sink without fin (HSNF), heat sink with square pin fins (HSSPF), and heat sink with circular pin fins (HSCPF) have been considered. For varied nanoparticle concentrations (∅=0.5 and 1) and for the same heat flux value (q′ =2.5 kW/m2 ), thermal performance of different HS designs is investigated. Up to 80°C, the HSSPF filled with PCM/NePCM performs better than the other two HS configurations considered in terms of thermal performance. Above this temperature, HSNF gives better results. HSSPF attains the highest value of enhancement ratio of 4.1 for SPT as 65℃.