Development and business viability of Bio-based Phase Change Materials (BPCM) from vegetable oil for application in the construction sector

Abstract

Climate change and the high energy demand of buildings require scalable solutions that improve thermal comfort, while reducing emissions and waste. This project develops sustainable phase change materials (PCM) from vegetable oil streams and converts them into microencapsulated PCM (MPCM) using recycled polymer shells, enabling passive thermal energy storage in mortars. Laboratory work focused on characterising olive oil, refining the PCM phase through fatty acid fractionation to obtain clearer thermal transitions and producing MPCM powder by solvent evaporation in an oil in water system with recycled PMMA as shell material. Different fractionation routes were examined, such as dry fractionation, solvent crystallisation and urea complexation. Among them, urea complexation provided the most effective separation, enabling the selection of an unsaturated enriched fraction as the MPCM core. Thermal and morphological analyses confirmed microcapsule formation and partial retention of phase behaviour, while also identifying technical challenges such as agglomeration and porosity that must be adressed to improve effective latent heat losses. In parallel, the results were translated into a B2B business proposal through market and competitor assessment and the development of marketing, operational, legal and financial plans. The financial model was built directly from experimentally obtained material balances and shows that process optimisation is the main lever to reach profitability at pilot scale. Through the combined chemical and business approach, this study supports a circular pathway that valorises waste streams, reduces environmental impact, and enhances wellbeing by improving indoor comfort and energy efficiency in buildings