Effect of using phase change materials in protective clothing on human thermal comfort under extreme cold conditions

Providing the human thermal comfort, because of its impact on productivity and health is very important. This can be more challenging under extreme cold conditions and when the human body cannot adapt itself to the environment by using the physiological thermoregulatory mechanisms. Under these conditions, using protective clothing is one of the effective ways to protect the human body against the thermal injuries. In this study, the performance of protective clothing with a Phase Change Material (PCM) layer has been analysed by simultaneous modeling of physical and physiological mechanisms of the human under extreme cold conditions. For this purpose, multi-layer protective clothing with a PCM layer has been considered and its thermal performance has been investigated for two different arrangements of the layers. The results show that the middle layer of protective clothing is the best position for implementing the PCM layer and the best melting temperature for the mentioned PCM is about 10˚C. Also, using the PCMs in protective clothing can increase the thermal tolerating time from 4000 seconds up to 6000 seconds under extreme cold conditions.