The influence of the microstructure of heterogeneous material on heat propagation was studied by the homogenization method of periodic media. This approach is based on the analysis of third-order heat balance equations. The physical interpretation of the corrective terms due to the existence of heterogeneities is also discussed in detail. It is shown that the higher terms introduce successive gradients of temperature and tensors, characteristic of the microstructure, which result in non-local effects. With respect to the heat plane wave, a dispersion phenomenon was shown. Finally, an application is described for periodically stratified composites.