PCM Packed-Bed Thermal Storage: Thermocline Profile (2D)

Bed Operation

HTF inlet temperature 85 °C

Flow rate 1.00 kg/s

PCM capsule material

Simulation speed 4×

Live Readouts

Thermocline depth

Outlet HTF temp

20.0 °C

Energy stored

Bed melt fraction

How it works

This is the 2D-native counterpart to the 3D instanced-capsule packed-bed simulator. Instead of orbiting spheres in a cylinder, it draws the three things that actually generate the physics: a bed-depth heatmap strip, the live temperature-vs-depth profile that is the thermocline front, and the PCM material's own effective-heat-capacity / enthalpy curve. Same Schumann two-phase packed-bed model underneath:

T_f,out = T_p + (T_f,in − T_p) · exp(−NTU),   NTU = hA / (ṁ c_f)
m_p · c_eff(T_p) · dT_p/dt = hA · (T_f,avg − T_p)
c_eff(T) = c_solid or c_liquid,  plus  L/ΔT   when |T − T_m| < ΔT/2

Charge / Discharge — sets whether the inlet HTF is hotter or colder than the bed, i.e. whether the bed is melting (storing) or freezing (releasing) the PCM.
Inlet temperature — the HTF temperature entering the top layer of the profile plot.
Flow rate — raises ṁ and, through h ∝ ṁ^0.6, the convective coefficient — a faster flow drives the front through the bed faster but with a shallower gradient in the profile plot.
Thermocline depth — the fraction of layers, walking from the inlet side of the profile plot, whose temperature has crossed the midpoint between ambient and inlet.
Enthalpy panel — shows why the front moves the way it does: the effective-heat-capacity spike and the enthalpy plateau around the PCM's own melting point, with the current bed-average temperature marked live.

Real-world relevance: this exact scheme (macro-encapsulated PCM spheres in a packed column) is used in solar-thermal plants, district-heating buffer tanks and building HVAC storage to store several hours of heat in a fraction of the volume a sensible-heat-only tank would need.

Cold / solid PCM Hot / liquid PCM