A research team at Boston College has shown that nanomaterials assembled on a flat surface platform displayed enhanced efficiency of seven to eight times than that of the earlier solar thermoelectric generators, enabling solar-thermal energy conversion for residential and industrial applications.
The team also included researchers from MIT. The research paper has been published in the journal Nature Materials.
Photovoltaics change sunlight into electricity, but the heat derived from solar energy utilizes sunlight to heat water, which then generates thermal energy. PV cells have been used as flat panels but solar-thermal energy generation uses surfaces that absorb sunlight suitable for housing and industrial environments. Solar thermal products have limited properties rendering them uneconomical. The team has unveiled two solutions including a surface that absorbs light through a nanostructured thermoelectric material placed inside a vacuum-sealed flat panel that is energy efficient. The combined measurements added the capacity to enhance electricity production to solar-thermal energy technology, according to Boston College professor of physics Zhifeng Ren, who has co-authored the research paper.
A hybrid flat panel that could produce hot water and electricity in a single system was developed. The team used a nano-technological design to integrate thermoelectric materials and targeted solar absorbers within a vacuum-sealed chamber to enhance conversion. Other authors include MIT's Soderberg Professor of Power Engineering Gang Chen, students of both colleges, researchers at GMZ Energy, a Massachusetts clean energy research institute co-founded by Ren and Chen.
The discovery could enable cost-efficient method to convert sunlight into electricity for both housing and industrial applications.
Source: http://bc.edu