LAUSR

Abstract Building energy consumption is an important part of energy consumption. Popularizing latent heat storage technology in building is beneficial to reducing building energy consumption. Phase change materials (PCMs) are important carriers of latent heat energy storage technology. The application of PCMs in building materials is helpful in increasing the latent heat storage capacity of the building. The leakage of PCMs can be prevented and the thermal conductivity of PCMs can be improved by incorporation of PCMs into inorganic porous media. Among various types of inorganic porous materials, the materials containing mainly micropores (0.1 μm–100 μm) such as expanded perlite (EP), expanded vermiculite (EV), diatomite and expanded graphite (EG) have characteristics of high porosity, moderate pore diameter, low price and wide sources. The four kinds of inorganic porous medium based composite PCMs are suitable for large-scale usage in cement mortar. In this paper, the preparation, thermal properties, and performance improvement of the four composite PCMs are reviewed. The effects of them on the properties of cement mortar are also summarized.