Influence of non-conducting pore inclusions on phase change behavior of porous media with constant heat flux boundary

A one-dimensional analytical solution was presented for the temporal variation of phase interface in two-phase materials having randomly distributed stagnant low conducting pores with constant heat flux boundary. For validation, numerical simulations based on the finite difference method were conducted. It was demonstrated that the phase interface propagates faster with pore inclusion than that associated with constant wall temperature boundary. Such faster movement of the phase interface is attributed to the decreased effective density of the medium as a result of the included low conducting pores. The decreased effective density reduces the amount of latent heat of the medium whilst the amount of heat removed at the boundary remains constant. Therefore, at a given period of time, more latent heat is liberated. In addition, for a given porosity, the influence of pore shape upon phase change interface location is negligible since the effective conductivity, although varying considerably with pore shape, has a marginal effect on the behavior of phase change interface.