Low cost, High Efficiency Luminescent Solar Greenhouse
Creators: name: University Of California Office Of The President
Publisher: name: University of California Office of the President
publisherIdentifier: https://ror.org/00dmfq477
publisherIdentifierScheme: ROR
Year: 2024

description: Building-integrated Photovoltaics (BIPV) offer a large market opportunity for solar power installations in the state of California since the cost of the building can be used to offset the cost of the integrated solar panels. Nonetheless, deployment of BIPV has been severally limited. Our goal is to accelerate the deployment of BIPV through the research and development of solar windows consisting of semitransparent luminescent solar concentrators (LSC) with greatly enhanced environmental and energy value. Our innovative LSC design includes the use of semiconducting polymers and dyes that absorb the solar spectrum with high efficiency and minimal self-absorption, a waveguide design that captures a greater fraction of the emitted light, a high efficiency PV strip optimized for LSCs, and a cell design that is compatible with existing printing and glass manufacturing lines to enable very rapid scale-up and deployment by California manufacturers. These optimized LSC cells will be incorporated into standard double-pane glass windows and assembled into a luminescent greenhouse structure in order to monitor reliability and power generation during one year of exposure to California outdoor testing conditions. The impact of our window-integrated LSC technology on plant growth, carbon dioxide uptake, and water retention will also be studied. Finally, the robustness of the LSC greenhouse to a variety of weather conditions, shading, and 20-year lifetimes under accelerated conditions will be evaluated. Our long term objective is to demonstrate that window-integrated luminescent solar concentrators meet an additional (over existing window manufacturing) cost target and CAPEX expense of less than $0.50/W and $0.1 million per MW, respectively, are robust to California weather and shading conditions, and meet 20-year accelerated lifetimes. An additional goal is to demonstrate that the shading and wavelength conversion provided by the integrated LSC will increase plant growth and water retention by over 10%, while reducing cooling requirements. To accomplish these objectives, we have brought together the expertise of Prof. Sue Carter, Prof. Glenn Alers, and Prof. Michael Loik from UC Santa Cruz, Dr. Leslie Bebout from NASA, and industrial sponsors, Abengoa Solar and National Semiconductor. This discovery and research training grant will train 2 graduate students, 2 postdoctoral researchers, and 2 undergraduates in the research and use of PV in buildings and agriculture, areas of high job growth in California. This grant is an interdisciplinary effort, combining engineers, materials scientists, device physicists, biologists, and environmental scientists. Students will have the chance to be mentored by more than one faculty member, will have the opportunity to work with scientists from national laboratories and industry, and will present their results at conferences and in publications.