A Laboratory Procedure to Determine the Thermal Properties of Silt Loam Soils Based on ASTM D 5334

Carles M. Rubio^1,

¹Department. Agri-Food Engineering and Biotechnology, Politechnical University of Catalonia, Castelldefels, Spain

Cite this paper:
Carles M. Rubio. A Laboratory Procedure to Determine the Thermal Properties of Silt Loam Soils Based on ASTM D 5334. Applied Ecology and Environmental Sciences. 2013; 1(4):45-48. doi: 10.12691/aees-1-4-2

Abstract

Nowadays, there are three variables measured for the characterization of the thermal properties in porous media and soft rocks. These are the volumetric specific heat capacity, the thermal conductivity and the thermal diffusivity. Recently, Decagon Devices has developed the KD2-Pro meter. This instrument is a useful device, which permits storing more than 4000 thermal data. This company has also improved the design of sensors for this specific use. KD2-Pro uses the infinite line heat pulse method based on current standard ASTM D 5334. Nevertheless, it is not clear how to obtain the required reliability and accuracy in the measurements since neither the standard nor manufacturer’s user manual do not include any method or recommendation for that. Therefore, a strong methodology is required to achieve the maximum efficiency when KD2-Pro is used. This work presents the first "stadium" towards the development of a laboratory and field methodology to obtain reliability, accuracy and rapidity in the analytical dataset of thermal properties in porous media.

Keywords:
thermal conductivity thermal diffusivity volumetric heat capacity water content volume of air

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