The heat transfer processes taking place in the side wall of a thermocline enclosure have been analyzed for idealized conditions based on the assumption that, at any instant time, side wall heat transfer processses are independent of the thermocline bulk motion. However, the axial tempera-ture distribution in the thermocline core provides the means for specifying the liquid medium-side boundary condition to the enclosure side wall. A picture is drawn which reflects the side wan response to thermocline bulk motion within the frame work of a quasi-steady analytic approach. For valves of the parameters typical of systems of engineering interest, the analysis shows that a significant amount of heat transfer short - circuiting can take place along the side wall enclosure. This phenomenon is favored by high values of $H_l$ and low values of P and $H_g$ respec-tively. The location of the point of zero normal heat flux on the side wan can be expected to mark, approximately, the region of confluence of two sidewall boundary flows respectively driven by the buoyant effects.