A Preliminary Investigation on the Photothermal Properties of Luminescent Solar Concentrators

Luminescent solar concentrators (LSCs) are considered promising photovoltaic (PV) devices to circumvent practical issues of applying conventional solar panels to the built environment. However, LSCs suffer from low power conversion efficiencies (PCEs) (typically <2% for devices of over 1 m2), despite numerous efforts having been made to develop novel luminescent materials and optical techniques. In this report, we proposed to utilize photothermal (PT) energy of the LSCs to further improve the PCE. We conducted a preliminary investigation on the PV and PT properties of an LSC with dimensions of 300 mm × 300 mm × 5 mm. The results showed that the PT power (27.05 W) was much higher than the PV power (2.12 W). Further analysis indicated that the PCE could reach 3.41% for a device of 1 m2.