The present invention generally relates to solar energy collectors and more specifically, to solar collectors using CIGS for photovoltaics, thermal working fluid heat collection and wave energy capture hybrid devices.
The general area of solar collectors is not new. Some solar cells include selective coating on the top surface which increase absorption of the light energy within the desired wavelength range. Moreover, optical coatings are commonly used to reflect light of undesirable wavelengths such as that within the infrared range in order to reduce excessive heating of the cell. Also, since only about 20% of absorbed radiation results in electric current, the other 80% is converted to heat. This heat then makes the photovoltaic element 10-20 percent less efficient, since increased cell temperatures generally result in a decrease in cell efficiency for producing electricity.
In the past there have been attempts to provide residential and industrial applications solar thermal collectors and solar photovoltaic cells, suitable for converting light energy into both electrical energy and thermal energy. These have had limited success mostly because of the added cost of the thermal portion designs and insufficient power output to cover these costs.
There have been some combined electrical and thermal solar collectors proposed. Some use flow tubes below plates, with thin perpendicularly heat-conductive web of rigidly connecting plate to flow tubes, inlet and outlet headers at opposite ends of flow tube, making parallel flow tubes below plates, to keep temperature gradients sufficiently low. These all have costs; flow tubes, flow tube construction, manufacturing and building collector, pumping fluid, and insufficient temperature removal.
Some proposed designs include a photovoltaic grid mounted on a copper plate that provide wider more uniform temperature dispersion across the plate and acts as a thermal radiator when the apparatus is used in the radiant cooling mode. This and a plurality of interconnected heat transfer tubes located within the enclosure and disposed on the plane below the copper plate but conductively coupled to the copper plate for converting the solar energy to thermal energy in a fluid disposed within the heat transfer tubes. Fresnel lenses can be affixed to the apparatus on mountings for concentrating the solar energy on to the photovoltaic grid and functioning as a passive solar tracker. These suffer from complexity and cost of manufacturing, requiring interconnected heat transfer tubes, a Fresnel lens, resistance calculations and bridge circuitry and more. Electronics and sensors have become better and cheaper, and the methods used are not current, keeping costs higher than other solutions. Others use flexible thermal solar collectors, instead of rigid collectors, but these are more expensive because of the flexibility of material and mounting is required.
Still other designs hybridize solar energy collectors with a photovoltaic collector that generates electricity and a thermal collector which is semi-transparent, utilizing shorter-wavelength radiation while selectively transmitting medium- and long-wavelength radiation to the thermal collector. The collectors are separated by a thermal insulating barrier and have a transparent exterior glass surface and a transparent body, adding cost. These have photovoltaic energy collector thermally insulated from heat generated by the thermal energy collector, instead of optimally transferring the PV energy collector heat directly to the thermal collector for the dual purpose of cooling the PV and collecting thermal energy.
Still other designs use a substantially unsealed enclosure, an array of photovoltaic cells for converting solar energy to electrical energy located within the enclosure, and a plurality of interconnected heat collecting tubes located within the enclosure and disposed on the same plane as the array of photovoltaic cells for converting solar energy to thermal energy in a fluid disposed within the heat collecting tubes. These again, are costlier tube constructs with interconnected heat collecting tubes located within the enclosure and disposed on the same plane as the array of photovoltaic cell, instead use open channels, slab geometry conduit and freon or other refrigerant gas working fluid. Open channel surface flow or slab geometry conduits with working fluid liquid or gas or both in the enclosure, or convective and conductive or capillary action energy transfer means may prove less expensive.
Single thin-film solar panel technology is emerging, composed of flexible aluminum substrate, electrically conductive back metal contact layer which could be deposited on the anodized flexible aluminum substrate. An anodized surface electrically insulates the aluminum substrate from the electrically conductive back metal contact layer; a semiconductor absorber layer is deposited on the back metal contact. The semiconductor absorber layer is constructed from a film selected from the group of metals composed of Copper, Indium, Gallium and Selenium, thus its name, CIGS thin film. These are emerging but not yet competitive with the conventional photovoltaic solar panels offered. The CIGS suffer from the deficiency that as they heat up thermally, they become less efficient and therefore less cost effective. Thus CIGS photovoltaic panels suffer from high cost and lower efficiency at higher temperatures.
Some companies have been engaged in the research and development of thin-film Cu(In,Ga)Se2 (CIGS) photovoltaic technology since 1991. Some have pursued a vacuum-based approach to CIGS production, using linear source technology and standard soda-lime glass substrates. The choices result in layers having controllable purity and low physical defects, and production without significant hazards. Considerations such as these are important in helping to minimize the processing costs of CIGS. Thin film PV technologies have advanced considerably, however, for technologies to survive, they must also perform well commercially. As a result of such fiscal pressures, a big market player shut down two sophisticated thin film lines using alternate methods. In some cases it maybe premature to discard some thin film CIGS technologies until all the costs and benefits are all totaled. Perhaps the highest yield technology will would be costlier than a hybrid with the lower cost CIGS but less efficient. This CIGS technology coupled with a complementary solar technology, may increase the total collector yield or give the total cost below a cost/benefit improvement over the higher efficiency CIGS technology. Thus, what is needed is hybrid technology which can be scaled and complementary to the CIGS thin film technology to maximize the utility of solar technology.
Water is becoming a more precious commodity, in support of every growing population. However, in California alone, typical reservoir surface area normally exposes 647,200 acres, shrinking substantially in drought years and appreciably in the autumn of a normal year. The total average annual evaporation from these areas is 2.3 million acre-feet. This amounts to an average evaporation from reservoirs, in the neighborhood of 60 inches averaged over the whole state. Thus a need for water retention can be satisfied if the surface were partially covered, as vaporization occurs across the solar exposed water surface. But to cover the water surface, would be prohibitively costly and unjustified, therefore it is not contemplated. Recreation use would be affected, but there are bodies of water that do not have recreational use or only partial use. Therefore, what is needed are ways of saving water and capturing the solar energy generally rendered useless in evaporation.
Generally, photovoltaic CIGS solar panels need a way of cooling the cell array in a cost effective manner and solar hybrid collectors need to be manufactured and made cheaper. Methods and designs for heat transfer and cooling photovoltaic without expensive insulation, manufacturing costs and smarter heat transfer designs, can harness thermal energy from the photovoltaics and collect the heat where it is needed. Such designs can be incorporated into photovoltaic raft structures that both shade reservoir water and produce higher efficiency PV generated electricity.
Expensive real estate has priced out placing solar collectors in many markets. Hence many residential and commercial applications of solar are not contemplated. Meanwhile, precious water is lost by evaporation from solar energy action. What is needed are cheaper and more efficient solar hybrids, solar hybrids which can solve other problems such as water loss due to evaporation, or solar hybrids which can take advantage of other forms of energy.
The present invention discloses a system for a hybrid solar energy collector comprising: a outer thermal collector housing with one way exterior surface to trap solar radiation, housing a flat CIGS photovoltaic energy collector, the photovoltaic energy collector being thermally coupled to an energy absorbing working fluid casing for flowing heat out to heat sink The solar radiation is trapped in the collector, generating electrical power from the CIGS photovoltaic array. The array is cooled by the working fluid transferring unproductive heat away from the photovoltaic array and into an exterior heat sink via the cooling fluid circuit, thus making the photovoltaic array more efficient, while adding another energy source from waste heat. A water floating collector is also presented, adding yet the wave energy into the collector array. These may be more cost effective to cool the CIGS PV array panels using transpiration cooling spray pumped from onboard hybrid wave or wind power sources.
Specific embodiments of the invention will be described in detail with reference to the following figures.
In the following detailed description of embodiments of the invention, numerous specific details are set forth in order to provide a more thorough understanding of the invention. However, it will be apparent to one of ordinary skill in the art that the invention may be practiced without these specific details. In other instances, well-known features have not been described in detail to avoid unnecessarily complicating the description.
The present invention is a system and method of converting solar energy to electrical energy via several parallel paths acting concurrently.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a more efficient and cost effective solar technology, one that uses CIGS in combination with thermal collectors.
It is another object of the present invention to provide embodiments designed for water surfaces, to take advantage of more affordable locations for solar arrays, reduce fresh water loss from evaporation, harness wave energy in parallel to increase efficiency, provide a heat sink cooling photovoltaics to increase conversion efficiency, provide a floating power source and for other benefits from locating solar platforms on inland or ocean sites.
Many methods of CIGS deposition; spray, sputtering, layers, rolling, special treatment, buffer combinations, buffer layers, junction formations, material compositions, composites, patterning, etc and substrates; production, interconnect methods, fabrication, etc are known to those skilled in the art. Some create higher efficiencies but may have higher costs. An objective of the invention is to use the least expensive approach which with the thermal heat harnessed as a part of the solar hybrid system, yields the highest total solar energy capture per unit cost. As with most all PV, the CIGS efficiency improves where the temperature can be maintained within certain levels. Thus, the temperature extracted in heat from the CIGS panel and harnessed in the thermal heat portion, the overall unit efficiency increases.
The solar photovoltaic panels transmit the electrical power to shore via cable 703. As a wave passes down the length of floatation panel 707 array, the hinged joints 713 on the power conversion modules, known to those skilled in the art, allow the floatation panels 707 to move up and down and side to side. The motion of the solar floatation platforms 707 relative to each other, drives pumps that turn generators inside the hinge wave energy harnessing device 713. The electricity flows via a cable 703 to a shore-based grid. Some harnessed energy can be used to pump cooling or evaporative spray water over the solar panels 705 to increase their efficiency, as cooling CIGS cells to optimal temperatures can increase efficiency by 10%-20%. For some situations, it is estimated that the power needed to pump cooling or evaporative spray water over the panels is much less than the incremental power produced by the photovoltaics at the cooler temperatures, thus synergistically justifying the energy cost of pumping.
The housing 1003 is configured in a shallow “W”, with a reflecting inside surface, for catching solar rays not impinging on the outer cell 1001 structure, but finding the opposite CIGS surface 1011 by reflection. The “W” housing 1003 configuration provides a structurally stronger housing less costly materials and manufacturing. Using a shallow “W” housing can focus solar radiation from a 3 to 1 advantage, since the area of the “W” will reflect light to the smaller area of the array 1001. not a strict requirements, as drain holes can be designed into the “W” shape corners should the collect rain or other fluids in the trough like housing structure.
Therefore, while the invention has been described with respect to a limited number of embodiments, those skilled in the art, having benefit of this invention, will appreciate that other embodiments can be devised which do not depart from the scope of the invention as disclosed herein. Other aspects of the invention will be apparent from the following description and the appended claims.