Experimental Investigation on Thermal Properties and Fire Performance of Lauric Acid/Diphenyl Phosphate/Expanded Perlite as a Flame Retardant Phase Change Material for Latent Heat Storage Applications

The form-stable composite energy storage developed in this study was produced by integrating a novel flame retardant phase change material formed of 90 wt% lauric acid (LA) as a phase change material and 10 wt% resorcinol bis(diphenyl phosphate) (RDP) as a flame retardant into a supporting material of expanded perlite (EP) without leakage. A differential scanning calorimeter (DSC) test is employed to characterize the mass ratio of LA_RDP, and a filter paper is used to assess the leakage test of LA_RDP/EP. Results from scanning electron microscopy (SEM) show that the flame retardant phase change material of LA_RDP has been successfully embedded into EP’s porous structure. Moreover, chemical compatibility of composites is analyzed by fourier transform-infrared spectrometer (FT-IR). According to the DSC test, the flame retardant phase change material developed of LA_RDP/EP has an appropriate phase transition temperature of ∼ 40–45 °C and fusion latent heat range of ∼ 86.02–88.29 J/g for thermal control in buildings. After 50 thermal cycles, the thermal cycling test depicted that the composite PCM possess outstanding thermal reliability. By incorporating 5 wt% expanded graphite (EG), the thermal conductivity of the LA_RDP/EP composite is enhanced by about 41.6%. In accordance with the thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) test, the produced flame retardant and EP reduces the mass loss of LA. Cone calorimetry is also utilized to examine the flame retardant phase change material composite’s flammability characteristics. LA_RDP/EP demonstrates valued thermal properties while lowering the flammability of LA. The findings demonstrated that the formed LA_RDP/EP composite might be assessed as a suitable material in thermal applications for effective and sustainable energy use.