Estimation of Cooling Performance of PCM Module by Using CFD Analysis With Enthalpy Porosity Method

This paper describes transient cooling technology for electronic equipment using Phase Change Material (PCM). In previous our report, we can estimate the cooling performance of PCM by using thermal network method, which can not calculate melted PCM flow. In this paper, we further consider the heat transfer phenomena of PCM more deeply by using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) analysis with Enthalpy Porosity Method. By using this method, we can calculate phase change phenomena and flowing phenomena of melted PCM with CFD analysis. The calculation results showed that, high temperature and low temperature location exist on the substrate in the case that PCM module is set vertically. If several devices are cooled with PCM module, most power consuming device must be set in lower part of PCM module. Further, we discussed the reason why the thermal network method can predict PCM module performance though natural convective flow can not be expressed in the thermal network method.