Towards photonic luminescent solar concentrators

Gutmann J, Peters M, Blsi B, Hermle M, Zappe H, Goldschmidt JC (2011)

Publication Type: Conference contribution

Publication year: 2011

Journal

Proceedings of SPIE Society of Photo-optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE)

Book Volume: 8111

Conference Proceedings Title: Proceedings of SPIE - The International Society for Optical Engineering

Event location: USA

ISBN: 9780819487216

DOI: 10.1117/12.893104

Abstract

Luminescent solar concentrators (LSC) concentrate both diffuse and direct radiation with no need for tracking. They consist of transparent plates doped with luminescent materials that absorb incident light. Most of the emitted light is trapped inside the plate by total internal reflection, where it is guided to solar cells at the plate's edge faces. We investigate the concept of a photonic LSC (PLSC) that mitigates the major LSC loss mechanisms, namely the escape cone and reabsorption of emitted light. Embedding the luminescent material in a photonic crystal allows highly efficient light guiding and can reduce reabsorption through inhibited emission at unwanted wavelengths. We present FDTD simulations that show how the emission characteristic is influenced by the surrounding structure due to an altered photon density of states. Further, enhanced light guiding in a broad spectral range was obtained with efficiencies of up to 99.7%. We also report on our progress in fabrication of PLSC devices for experimental investigation of the concept: polymer thin films with and without luminescent doping were spin coated and characterized to estimate the number of dye layers needed in PLSCs to achieve sufficiently high absorption. © 2011 SPIE.

Involved external institutions

Fraunhofer-Institut für Solare Energiesysteme (ISE) / Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems DE Germany (DE) Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg DE Germany (DE)

How to cite

APA:

Gutmann, J., Peters, M., Blsi, B., Hermle, M., Zappe, H., & Goldschmidt, J.C. (2011). Towards photonic luminescent solar concentrators. In Proceedings of SPIE - The International Society for Optical Engineering. USA.

MLA:

Gutmann, Johannes, et al. "Towards photonic luminescent solar concentrators." Proceedings of the Next Generation (Nano) Photonic and Cell Technologies for Solar Energy Conversion II, USA 2011.

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