Coconuts and lemons enable a thermal wood for indoor heating and cooling
![Peter Olsén and Céline Montanari, researchers in the Department of Biocomposites at KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm. (Photo: David Callahan)](/data/images/00904/1c0070ad-faac-444c-9b5f-16da2785cc79-w_720.jpg)
Researchers reported the development in the scientific journal, Small. Peter Olsén, researcher in the Department of Biocomposites at KTH, says the material is capable of storing both heat and cold. If used in housing construction, the researchers say that 100 kilos of the material can save about 2.5 kWh per day in heating or cooling—given an ambient temperature of 24C.
KTH researcher Céline Montanari says that besides sunlight, any heat source can charge the battery. “The key is that the temperature fluctuates around the transition temperature, 24C, which can of course be tailored depending on the application and location,” she says.
The process starts with removing lignin from wood, which creates open pores in the wood cells walls, and removes color. Later the wood structure is filled with a citrus-based molecule—limonene acrylate—and coconut based molecule. Limonene acrylate transforms into a bio-based polymer when heated, restoring the wood’s strength and allowing light to permeate. When this happens the coconut molecule are trapped within the material, enabling the storage and release of energy.
“The elegance is that the coconut molecules can transition from a solid-to-liquid which absorbs energy; or from liquid-to-solid which releases energy, in much the same way that water freezes and melts,” Montanari says. But in the transparent wood, that transition happens at a more comfortable 24C
“Through this transition, we can heat or cool our surroundings, whichever is needed,” Olsén says
Olsén says that potential uses include exterior and interior building material for both transparency and energy saving – in exteriors and interiors. The first application of the product would be for interior spaces to regulate temperatures around the 24C mark to cool and to heat. More study is needed to develop it for exterior use.
And it’s not just for homes or buildings. “Why not as a future material in greenhouses?” he says. “When the sun shines, the wood becomes transparent and stores more energy, while at night it becomes cloudy and releases the heat stored during the day. That would help reduce energy consumption for heating and at the same time provide improved growth.”
"Sustainable Thermal Energy Batteries from Fully Bio-Based Transparent Wood", Small, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/smll.202301262
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![Peter Olsén and Céline Montanari, researchers in the Department of Biocomposites at KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm. (Photo: David Callahan)](/data/images/00904/1c0070ad-faac-444c-9b5f-16da2785cc79-w_240.jpg)
About KTH Royal Institute of Technology
About KTH Royal Institute of Technology
Since its founding in 1827, KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm has become one of Europe’s leading technical and engineering universities, as well as a key center of intellectual talent and innovation.
KTH works with industry and society in the pursuit of sustainable solutions to some of humanity’s greatest challenges: climate change, future energy supply, urbanization and quality of life for the rapidly-growing elderly population. We are addressing these with world leading, high-impact research and education in natural sciences and all branches of engineering, as well as in architecture, industrial management, urban planning, history and philosophy.
KTH is Sweden’s largest technical research and learning institution and home to students, researchers and faculty from around the world.
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