Thermal Mass

Thermal mass (Cth, also called thermal capacitance or heat capacity) is the capacity of a body to store heat. It is typically measured in units of J/°C or J/K (which are equivalent). If the body consists of a homogeneous material with sufficiently known physical properties, the thermal mass is simply the amount of material present times the specific heat capacity of that material. For bodies made of many materials, the sum of heat capacities for their pure components may be used in the calculation, or in some cases (as for a whole animal, for example) the number may simply be measured for the entire body in question, directly.