Aerogel-based solar thermal receivers
Author(s)
McEnaney, Kenneth; Weinstein, Lee Adragon; Kraemer, Daniel; Ghasemi, Hadi; Chen, Gang
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In any solar thermal application, such as solar space heating, solar hot water for domestic or industrial use, concentrating solar power, or solar air conditioning, a solar receiver converts incident sunlight into heat. In order to be efficient, the receiver must ideally absorb the entire solar spectrum while losing relatively little heat. Currently, state-of-the-art receivers utilize a vacuum gap above an absorbing surface to minimize the convection losses, and selective surfaces to reduce radiative losses. Here we investigate a receiver design that utilizes aerogels to suppress radiation losses, boosting the efficiency of solar thermal conversion. We predict that receivers using aerogels could be more efficient than vacuum-gap receivers over a wide range of operating temperatures and optical concentrations. Aerogel-based receivers also make possible new geometries that cannot be achieved with vacuum-gap receivers. Keywords: Solar receiver; Solar thermal; Aerogel
Date issued
2017-10Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Mechanical EngineeringJournal
Nano Energy
Publisher
Elsevier BV
Citation
McEnaney, Kenneth et al. "Aerogel-based solar thermal receivers." Nano Energy 40 (October 2017): 180-186 © 2017 Elsevier
Version: Original manuscript
ISSN
2211-2855
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