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Energy Conversion Efciency of a Novel Hybrid Solar System for Photovoltaic, Thermoelectric, and Heat Utilization
Dajiang Yang and Huiming Yin
AbstractA novel hybrid solar system has been designed to utilize photovoltaic (PV) cells, thermoelectric (TE) modules, and hot water (HW) through a multilayered building envelope. Water pipelines are cast within a functionally graded material layer to serve as a heat sink, allowing heat to be easily transferred into owing water through an aluminum-rich surface, while remaining insulated by a polymer rich bottom. The theoretical energy conversion efciency limit of the system has been investigated for documenting the potential of this hybrid solar panel design. Given the material properties of each layer, the actual energy conversion efciency depends on the solar irradiation, ambient temperature, and water ow temperature. Compared to the traditional solar panel, this design can achieve better overall efciencies with higher electrical power output and thermal energy utilization. Based on theoretical conversion efciency limits, the PV/TE/HW system is superior to PV/HW and traditional PV systems with 30% higher output electrical power. However, the advantages of the PV/TE/HW system are not signicant from experimental data due to the low efciency of the bulk TE material. Thus, QW/QD TE materials are highly recommended to enhance the overall efciency of the PV/TE/HW design. This design is general and open to new PV and TE materials with emerging nanotechnology for higher efciencies. Index TermsConversion efciency, hybrid solar panel, photovoltaic (PV), renewable energy, thermodynamics, thermoelectrics (TEs).

I. INTRODUCTION OLAR energy has been considered as a promising solution for the energy and environmental challenges and the global warming threat [1][6]. We are suffering from an energy crisis and environmental pollution related to fossil fuel combustion [7], [8]. The Sun delivers energy to the Earth with power of 1.2 105 TW, which is about 104 times of the rate at which human civilization currently produces and uses [9]. Moreover, solar energy is clean, reliable, renewable, and environment friendly.

Manuscript received July 14, 2010; revised October 15, 2010 and November 30, 2010; accepted January 17, 2011. Date of publication March 24, 2011; date of current version May 18, 2011. This work was supported in part by the National Science Foundation Civil, Mechanical, and Manufacturing Innovation (CMMI) under Grant 0954717 and in part by the Department of Energy Small Business Technology Transfer Program (STTR) under Grant DE-SC0003347. Paper no. TEC-00291-2010. The authors are with the Department of Civil Engineering and Engineering Mechanics, Columbia University, NY 10027 USA (e-mail: dy2209@columbia.edu; yin@civil.columbia.edu). Color versions of one or more of the gures in this paper are available online at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org. Digital Object Identier 10.1109/TEC.2011.2112363

Direct and efcient use of solar energy has been given high priority to address energy and environmental issues. Photovoltaic (PV) technology can directly convert solar energy into electrical energy without any emissions. Since the rst recognition in 1839 [10], PV technology has achieved tremendous progress. However, there is still much effort needed in the aspects of efciency improvement and cost reduction. For the single-crystalline single junction Si technology, the conversion efciency keeps lower than 30% [9], [11], [12]. Thus, a large portion of solar energy is wasted through heat dissipation [13], [14]. Although some emerging technologies can considerably improve energy utilization efciency, such as multijunction cells [15], [16], optical frequency shifting [17], [18], multiple exciton generation cells [19], multiple energy level cells [20], hot carrier cells [21], and concentration PV system [22], these technologies require high cost and complex service conditions, and thus have not been commercially used in solar roong panel yet. Solar thermal technology provides another way to use the thermal energy of solar insolation. Solar thermal collectors have been applied to domestic (bathing, cooking, space heating, swimming pool heating, etc.) and commercial sectors (preheating of boiler, hospitals, etc.). However, the applications of solar thermal collectors are limited by heat demand and architectural esthetics. Thermoelectric (TE) module can be a good candidate for thermal energy harvesting. It can directly convert heat energy into electricity, which is determined by the temperature difference between two sides of the module. As a solid-state device without any moving parts, a TE generator can be completely silent and extremely reliable. It can be used for years to provide electrical power. However, the existing TE modules are quite expensive and their conversion efciencies are low in nonconcentrated solar energy technologies. Emerging nanotechnology in TE cells may change this situation and enable a new type of solar energy technology. Typically, energy payback time (EPBT) for solar thermal system is less than that of PV systems. The EPBT of PV system can be reduced by using it in a hybrid system integrating PV with solar thermal components, such as hot water (HW) tubes and TE [23]. The combination of two or three of the approaches is not a simple superposition of the materials and costs, but provides a viable solution to signicantly increase overall energy utilization efciency while alleviating the disadvantages of a single approach [24]. A PV-thermal collector enables heat harvesting while improving the PV utilization efciency by controlling the

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temperature of PV modules. Currently, some groups have studied the performance of PVTE hybrid systems [25][27], which provide the good justications of the solar hybrid approaches. This paper introduces a novel hybrid PV/TE/HW solar system including single-crystalline PV cells, bismuth telluride (Bi2 Te3 ) TE modules, and HW tubes cast in a functionally graded material (FGM). The performance of this multilayer hybrid system will be predicted and characterized. The testing results show the energy harvesting performance of the hybrid solar panels, which is plausible compared to traditional solar panels. The design with quantum well (QW) and quantum dot (QD) TE modules could enhance the output electric power and, thus, obtain a higher efciency. Currently, most QW/QD structures are fabricated with a molecular beam epitaxial technique [28][30], which is an expensive process compared to the traditional bulk material fabrication techniques [31]. Recently, it was reported that QD TE structures were fabricated by a colloidal method, which could be a promising technique to make cost-effective TE materials [32], [33]. The remainder of this paper is organized as follows. Section II introduces the hybrid solar panel design and prototypic panel preparation. In Section III, assuming no heat loss occurred and ideal PV and TE materials available, we derive theoretical limits of energy conversion efciency of the hybrid and traditional PV systems. Considering the current working condition and materials used in the prototypes, the actual efciency is estimated. Section IV presents and analyzes the test results with prototypic solar panels. The PV and TE module efciency enhancement with the aid of the FGM layer is analyzed. Finally, some conclusion is drawn in Section V.

Fig. 1.

Schematic illustration of novel hybrid solar panel.

II. HYBRID SOLAR PANEL DESIGN AND PROTOTYPE PREPARATION A. Design of a Hybrid Solar Panel A novel hybrid solar panel has been designed for PV, TE, and HW utilization through a multilayered conguration, which is schematically illustrated in Fig. 1. A PV surface layer and the TE layer below transfer the photoelectric and TE energy into electricity, respectively. The TE layer is bonded to a plastic lumber plate through a FGM interlayer. The FGM contains aluminum (Al) powder dispersed in a high-density polyethylene (HDPE) matrix with a graded microstructure seen in the left top of Fig. 1. Water pipelines are cast within the FGM to control the panels temperature. The plastic lumber, made of recycled polymeric materials, provides mechanical loading support and heat insulation of the building skin. The innovations of the design are summarized as follows. 1) The temperature difference between the PV module and the water tubes provides a considerable temperature gradient within the TE layer for a higher efciency of TE utilization. 2) The HW, whose temperature is partially controlled by the ow rate, can be directly utilized by water heating systems for domestic usage.

3) Due to the temperature control on the roof, the room temperature can be signicantly reduced and thermal comfort in the building can be much improved. 4) Various materials and components will be chemically and physically compatible to assure a durable end product. 5) A high percentage of Al powder makes rapidly transfers heat into the water tubes, but below them the heat conduction is blocked by the HDPE and the plastic lumber substrate. 6) The thin lm PV layer improves the heat conduction and structural integrity within the panel, and protects the polymer materials underneath from UV radiation. 7) The plastic lumber substrate provides the mechanical and structural support for the upper layers and thermal insulation for indoor air as well as to prevent water condensation. In addition, the design of this roong panel is generalized, such that new high efcient PV and TE modules can be easily integrated into this structure. Because plastic lumber is mainly made of recylcled HDPE, at the end of their lifetime, solar panels can be recycled into plastic lumber again.

B. Materials for Prototypes The PV layers used in the panels are commercial singlecrystalline Si solar cells with an open circuit voltage V o c of 0.55 V, short circuit current I sc of 4400 mA, and an energy conversion efciency pv of 13% at room temperature (25 C) under 1000 W/m2 irradiation. The length, width, and thickness of the solar cell are 12.5 cm, 12.5 cm, and 270 m, respectively. The TE layer is currently made of bulk bismuth telluride (Bi2 Te3 ) alloys. A total of 97 Bi2 Te3 thermocouples are arranged electrically in series and thermally in parallel to form the TE module with a length of 2.9 cm, width of 2.9 cm, and thickness of 0.5 cm. Pure Al powder and HDPE matrix are used to fabricate the FGM layer. The thermal conductivities of Al and HDPE are 238 W/mK and 0.26 W/mK, respectively. The water tubes are made with copper (Cu) pipes with a diameter of 6.4 mm. The plastic lumber substrate is made of recycled polymeric materials. Fig. 2 shows the photos of the materials and solar panel prototypes.

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Fig. 3. Schematic illustration of the panel conguration and energy distribution.

TABLE I COST ANALYSIS OF THE HYBRID SOLAR PANELS Fig. 2. Photos of (a) single-crystalline Si solar cell, (b) TE module, (c) HDPE and Al powder, (d) solar panel before attachment of solar cell, and (e) prototype of hybrid solar panel with water tube connections.

C. Integration of Prototypes For comparison, solar panels with different congurations, e.g., traditional PV panel, sample A: PV/HW, and sample B: PV/TE/HW panels, are fabricated, as shown in Fig. 3. To fabricate the FGM layer, the HDPE and Al powder are mixed layer by layer with 50% Al volume fraction in the top layer and pure HDPE in the bottom. The molded FGM and Al powder matrix is baked in a vacuum at 200 C for 1.5 h and solidied with dimensions of 30.5 cm 30.5 cm 1.5 cm. Cu tubes are cast into the FGM layer with a separation of 2.5 cm. A vacuum sintering process is employed to bond the FGM layer with the plastic lumber substrate. Thermal conductive paste with a conductivity of 1.9 W/mK is used as an adhesive between the PV, TE, and FGM layers. The bare PV cells are directly bonded with the plastic lumber and the FGM layers to form the reference sample and sample A, respectively. For sample B, the TE layer is bonded with the FGM layer followed by bonding of the PV layer above the TE layer. The complete panels are degassed in a vacuum oven at 90 C for 2 h. T-type thermal couples (1 C) are attached on the panels to detect the temperature of the PV cells and water. The solar panels are tested in a solar room equipped with a metal halide lamp, which can provide irradiation up to 4 KW/m2 .A pyranometer is used to measure and calibrate the solar irradiation. The pyranometer was carefully calibrated based on a side-byside comparison with a reference pyranometer under a metal halide lamp. The reference pyranometer was compared with the Sun and sky radiation as source under mainly clear sky condition using the continuous sun-and-shade method. The readings are referred to the World Radiometric Reference as states in the World Metrological Organization (WMO) Technical Regulations. The total uncertainty of the pyranometer is

1.4%. The experimental data are collected with the Labview 8.0 data acquisition system.

D. Cost Analysis Available material and manufacturing cost data for similar existing products were used to estimate the cost of our panels in mass production. The cost estimates of the panels are provided in Table I. Though the hybrid panel contains heat recovery components, the integrated structure can save some materials compared to normal panels. The cost of PV/HW sample is around 417 $/m2 , which is comparable to normal solar panel price of 370430 $/m2 [34]. However, current TE technology is not yet cost effective for this application, as can be seen from sample B PV/TE/HW with 2095.88 $/m2 . Future research will work on high-efciency, low-cost QD TE module development.

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III. ENERGY CONVERSION EFFICIENCYTHEORETICAL LIMIT AND ACTUAL PREDICTION A. Theoretical Limit of Conversion Efciency Under Ideal Conditions For each panel conguration, we will theoretically calculate the energy conversion efciency limits, which are based on the ideal conditions without considering the temperature dependence. The environmental parameters shown in Fig. 3, such as solar room ambient temperature T am . 40 C, PV cell temperature Th 90 C, 50 C, and 70 C for the reference sample, sample A, and sample B, respectively, are set based on historical experimental data under equilibrium condition. The irradiation E in is set to 1000 W/m2 . The inlet and outlet water temperatures are controlled at 15 C and 30 C by adjusting the water ow rate. Shockley and Queisser [11] have calculated the thermodynamic efciency limit of single-crystalline Si solar cell based on the following assumptions: the Sun and cell are assumed to be blackbodies with temperatures of 6000 K and 300 K, respectively; one photon with energy greater than Si band gap Eg produces one electronhole pair, while photons of lower energy will produce no effect, when the cell is illuminated with unconcentrated sunlight. The maximum efciency is found to be 30% for a single p-n junction Si cell with an energy gap of 1.1 eV. Based on current TE technology, the efciency of the TE module can be expressed as TER = (Th TC ) Th (M 1) (M + TC /Th ) (1)

consequently, E in Epv ETE = 603.4 W/m2 power will be absorbed by HW system. B. Prediction of Energy Conversion Efciency of Actual Prototypes In the tests, the PV cell surface temperature could reach above 90 C under 1000 W/m2 irradiation without cooling treatment for the traditional PV panel. The actual energy conversion efciency of the solar cell was characterized as 13% at room temperature (25 C) under 1000 W/m2 irradiation, which will be shown in the next section. If we use the temperature coefcients of 0.46%/ C for single-crystalline Si cells reported by Kamedas et al. [37], the PV cell efciency could decrease to = 13% (10.46% (9025) = 9.1% at 90 C. The actual electric power generated by the traditional PV panel will be E pv = E in 9.1% = 91 W/m2 . Most of the thermal energy absorbed by the PV cells wasted. For sample A, as the FGM water cooling system is introduced, the PV cell temperature is set to 50 C, which produces an efciency pv value of 11.2%. The total generated electrical power is E in 11.2% = 112 W/m2 . To calculate how much thermal power can be transferred to the FGM layer, we need to know the reected power and the heat loss from the PV cell. Here, we use the American Society for Testing and Materials reference solar spectral irradiance Air Mass 1.5 B () for the calculation [38]. The total radiant ux emitted from the Sun can be expressed as [36]

F =
0

B ()d.

(4)

where TC and Th are the temperatures of the cold and hot junctions of the TE module, respectively, and M is dened by M= 1+Z (TC + Th ) 2
1/2

(2)

The solar cells used in this study are antireective coating coated single-crystalline structure. The reective spectrum R() can be approximated by the report data in [39] and [40]. So, the total reection energy can be calculated by

with Z being the gure of merit of the Bi2 Te3 module [35]. If Z approaches innite, the TE efciency will reach the Carnot limit [36], written as TE = 1 TC . Th (3)

Eref =
0

B () R()d.

(5)

First, let us consider the reference sample, which has PV cells directly attached to a substrate. It is a traditional PV panel conguration. The maximum electrical power output of the panel is E in 30% = 300 W/m2 . For the hybrid panel of sample A, under ideal condition, 300 W/m2 of electric power will be generated by PV cells, and at most 700 W/m2 power can be absorbed by the HW system if we neglect the energy loss through reection, radiation, and convection from PV cells. For sample B, similar as sample A, under ideal conditions, 300 W/m2 of electric power will be generated by the PV cell, and at most 700 W/m2 of power can be absorbed by the TE layer. We use the average value of inlet (15 C) and outlet (30 C) temperatures as the cold junction temperature TC and ThB 70 C as the hot junction temperature. The conversion efciency limit TE (Carnot limit) could be 13.8% based on (3). The electrical power generated by TE module is 700 13.8% = 96.6 W/m2 ;

If we set the total radiant ux F as 1000 W/m2 , the calculated reection power from PV cell E ref is 123.2 W/m2 . As the temperature of the PV cell ThA is 50 C and the ambient temperature T am is 40 C, the irradiative and convection heat loss can be calculated as
4 4 Tam ) = 43 W/m2 Erad . = s (ThA

(6) (7)
8

Econ . = hc (ThA Tam ) = 50 W/m

by using the reference value of = 0.6, s = 5.67 10 W/m2 K4 , and hc = 5 W/m2 K [36], [41], where , s, and hc are the average surface emissivity of silicon, StefanBoltzmann constant, and convection coefcient of air, respectively. Let us neglect the interfacial loss between the PV and FGM; the total heat power transferred to FGM layer will be E in Eref Epv Econ . Erad . = 671.8 W/m2 . For sample B, we set the PV cell stabilized temperature to 70 C, as incorporation of the TE module reduces the FGM cooling effect to some extent compared to sample A. The PV efciency pv value reduces to 10.3%, and the electrical power

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generated by the PV cell is E pv = E in 10.3% = 103 W/m2 . Similarly, we get the heat loss from the PV cell
4 4 Erad . = s (ThB Tam ) = 144.1 W/m2

TABLE II PERFORMANCE COMPARISON OF THE THREE TYPES OF SOLAR PANELS

(8) (9)

Econ . = hc (ThB Tam ) = 150 W/m .

So, the total power received by the TE module is E in Eref . Epv Econ . Erad . = 479.7 W/m2 . We use the average value of the inlet (15 C) and outlet (30 C) temperatures as the cold junction temperature TC and ThB 70 C as the hot junction temperature. The efciency of the bulk TE module would be 2.14% based on (1) and (2). Thus, the electric power converted by the TE module would be 469.2 W/m2 TER = 10.3 W/m2 . So, the total electrical power generated from sample B is E pv + ETE = 113.3 W/m2 . It is necessary to mention that the efciency of bulk TE material is not promising due to the low gure of merit Z . The Hi-Z group has fabricated Si/SiGe QW structure, which has Z values ve times higher than those of bulk SiGe couples. The Dresselhaus group also fabricated PbTe/Pb1 x Eux Te QW module, and they concluded that the QW Z may be up to ve times greater than the bulk value [28], [29]. Let us assume QW TE modules that are incorporated in the design; the efciency could be increased to 5.53%, corresponding to a TE power of 26.5 W/m2 . The total electric power of sample B will be 129.5 W/m2 , around 14% higher than sample A. Consequently, the thermal power received by the FGM layer should be 469.4 and 453.2 W/m2 for bulk and QW TE module panels, respectively. C. Summary of Energy Conversion Efciencies of Three Cases The overall performance comparisons of the three solar panels are summarized in Table II. Here, the air temperature of 40 C is used. Compared to the traditional PV panel, hybrid approaches have obvious advantages on both the electrical power and the thermal energy harvest. Compared to sample A (PV/HW), sample B (PV/TE/HW) has more than 30% of an improvement for the output electric power based on the theoretical limit. However, in actual prediction of prototypes, sample B only shows comparable performance to sample A due to the low efciency of the Bi2 Te3 bulk materials. Notice that if emerging QW TE modules can be introduced in this hybrid solar panel, a 14% improvement of the output electric power compared with sample A can be projected. In addition, the estimation is signicantly susceptible to the thermal management of heat transfer and interface integrity. IV. EXPERIMENTAL TESTS AND DISCUSSION A. Basic PV Cell and TE Module Performance Characterization Fig. 4 shows the test circuits of PV cell and TE module, where A denotes the ammeter and V the voltmeter. The typical I V curve of a solar cell at room temperature under 1000 W/m2 irradiation is shown in Fig. 5(a). The open circuits voltage is around 0.56 V and the short circuits current is around 4.32 A. The curve tting and maximum power P m ax extraction method follow the procedures in [42]. The cell ef-

Fig. 4. Circuit diagram for (a) solar cell I V characteristics determination and (b) measuring the maximum power output of the TE module.

ciency is dened as pv = P m ax /(E in 2A), where A is the area of the solar cell (12.5 cm 12.5 cm). The typical value of the solar cell efciency is around 13% at room temperature. Fig. 5(b) shows the difference between the tted and experimental current data of the solar cell. The strongly varying slope near P m ax makes it difcult to t with the normal least-squares method, which is consistent with Burgerss [43] observation. More advanced methodologies [43][45] would help to improve the tting accuracy. While we have measured I V curves of different samples, the extracted cell efciencies vary within 0.5% and the changes of efciencies are consistent with the experiment conditions, indicating that the current tting procedure is still valid in our comparative study. Fig. 5(c) shows the output power

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Fig. 6. PV cell efciencies of (a) sample A (PV/HW) and (b) sample B (PV/TE/HW) under different conditions.

Fig. 5. (a) Typical I V curve and output power of a solar cell at room temperature under 1000 W/m2 irradiation. (b) Difference between the tted and experimental current data of the solar cell. (c) Output power of the TE module versus load resistance.

of the TE module versus load resistance RL . The TE maximum output power happens when the load resistance RL is equal to the internal resistance Ri of the TE module. B. Hybrid Solar Panel Performance Test and Discussions The performance of the solar panels is chracterized in the following way: the solar panels are put in the solar room under the irradiations of 750 W/m2 , 1000 W/m2 , and 1200 W/m2 . Before the water ow starts, the PV cell efciencies and TE (only bulk

TE module tested due to the nonavailabilty of QW TE samples) output powers are measured with time until the panel temperature reaches to the maxium point and is stabilized. Then, the water ow is introduced with the inlet and outlet temperatures controlled at 15 C and 30 C, respectively. The PV and TE performances are measured continuously again until the panel temperature stabilizes again. The PV cell efciencies of sample A at different temperatures and irradiations are shown in Fig. 6(a). At room temperature (25 C), the PV cell efciencies are 16.9%, 12.9%, and 11.2% under the irradiations of 750 W/m2 , 1000 W/m2 , and 1200 W/m2 , respectively. Without water ow, the efciencies decrease as the temperature increases. The highest temperatures of PV cell can reach around 70 C and 90 C with the irradiations of 750 W/m2 and 1000 W/m2 or 1200 W/m2 , respectively. The PV efciencies nally decrease to 12.6%, 8.4%, and 7.1% for different irradiations. When water ow was introduced, the PV elements were rapidly cooled and the stabilized temperatures are 42 C, 44 C, and 45 C for different irradiation powers. The PV cell efciencies recover back to 16.6%, 12.1%, and 10.6%, which are around 3050% improved compared to those nal efciencies without water ow and keep above 90% of the efciencies at room temperature. These results are very encouraging and demonstrate good cooling performance of the FGM

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layer. Fig. 6(b) shows the PV performance of sample B. The PV efciencies changes with temperature are almost the same as those of sample A. Without the water ow, the stabilized PV cell efciencies are 12.8%, 7.9%, and 6.5%, and recover to 16.0%, 11%, and 9% with the water ow, which have around 2540% improvement, and keep above 85% of those efciencies at room temperature. It is necessary to point out that the incorporation of TE modules decreases the cooling effects of the water system, and thus, the nal cell efciencies of sample B are slightly worse than those of sample A. Fig. 7(a) shows the output power of the TE module with irradiation time under different irradiation conditions. Before the water ow starts, in the rst 35 min, the TE output powers are very low with values around 15 W/m2 , as the signicant temperature difference between hot and cold junctions of the TE module has not been set up. Between 5 and 15 min, the TE output powers increase rapidly and reach peak values around 6 8.5 W/m2 , and then gradually decrease with time and are nally stabilized at 24 W/m2 at around 150200 min. With the water ow introduced, the TE output powers increase rapidly and stay around 79.5 W/m2 under equilibrium condition. The stabilized TE output powers with water ow are around three times higher than those without water ow. To explain this observation, the temperature differences T (Th TC ) cross TE module versus time are plotted in Fig. 7(b). One can see that T s change with time have similar trends as those of TE output power, indicating that the TE efciency is mainly dominated by the temperature difference between the hot and cold junction. In the rst 015 min, the increase of T comes from the fast temperature increase of the TE top surface (hot junction), while the bottom face (cold junction) keeps at a low temperature due to the low thermal conductivity of Bi2 Te3 material. From 15 to 200 min, the cold junction temperature gradually increases and the hot junction temperature saturates under the equilibrium condition. As a result, T decreases and keeps around 12 18 C/cm at the time of 150200 min. Again, after the water ow is introduced, T rises sharply due to the cold junction temperature decrease and keeps at 2535 C/cm to maintain adaquate TE output power, indicating good cooling performance of the FGM layer. The overall electrical performance comparisons of the three different congurations are listed in Table III. Besides the HW utilization, both samples A and B show much higher electrical power output than those of traditional solar panels. The overall electrical power of sample B is slightly lower than that of sample A based on the bulk TE performance. The power gain from the TE module can almost compensate the PV electric power reduction due to the FGM cooling efciency loss. However, the investigation of TE incorporation in PV panels is meaningful, as TE materials gradually play increasingly more important roles in thermal energy harvest areas. So far, the most successfully commercialized TE material is Bi2 Te3 . Unfortunately, the conversion efciency of the bulk Bi2 Te3 module is not plausible due to the low ZT value of 1 [46]. ZT = S2 T/K, where S , , T , and K are its Seebeck coefcient, electrical conductivity, temperature, and thermal conductivity, respectively. In a conventional 3-D crystalline system, S, , and K are in-

Fig. 7. (a) TE module output power and (b) temperature gradient cross TE change with irradiation time under different irradiation conditions. TABLE III EXPERIMENTAL PERFORMANCE COMPARISON OF THE THREE PV PANELS

terrelated. An increase in S usually results in a decrease in . Also, increase in produces an increase in the electric contribution to K. Recently, low-dimensional TE materials have drawn a great amount of attention due to the different physical behaviors compared to their bulk counterparts. Hi-Z and Dresselhaus group [28], [29] have experimentally demonstrated that PbTe, Si/Ge QW structures can signicantly enhance the ZT values, which are about ve times higher than those of bulk material. Theoretically, QD structures may have even higher ZT values than those of QW structures [47]. The electronic density of state

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in QD is strongly quantized, exhibiting a delta-like function, which can enhance carrier density of states even more than in QW. Moreover, 3-D quantum connement produces more favorable carrier scattering mechanism and a much lower lattice thermal conductivity. Future work will focus on implementation of QW and QD TEs in the hybrid solar panel. V. CONCLUSION Hybrid solar panels integrated with Si solar cells, TE materials, and FGM water tube systems are demonstrated. The FGM water tube systems have good cooling function, which can recover the PV cell efciency by 3050% and 2540% for the PV/HW and PV/TE/HW system, respectively, by controlling the temperature and also enhance the TE output power by three times. Incorporation of bulk TE modules in the solar panel shows comparable performance as those of PV/FGM design. High-efciency QW/QD TE materials could potentially contribute higher electric power and enhance the overall efciency for PV/TE/HW design. ACKNOWLEDGMENT The authors would like to thank Dr. L. Li and A. Br ugger, managers of Carleton Laboratory, for their strong support on the solar panel fabrication. REFERENCES
[1] T. J. Crowley, Causes of climate change over the past 1000 years, Science, vol. 289, pp. 270277, 2000. [2] M. A. Green, Third Generation Photovoltaics: Advanced Solar Energy Conversion. Berlin, Germany: Springer-Verlag, 2004. [3] N. S. Lewis and G. Crabtree, "Basic research need for solar energy utilization: Report on the basic energy sciences workshop on solar energy utilization," Ofce Basic Energy Sci. s. l.: U.S., Department of Energy, Washington, DC, 2005. Available: http://www.science.doe.gov/bes/reports/les/SEU_rpt.pdf [4] J. Hemminger, "New Science for a secure and sustainable energy future: A report from the basic energy sciences advisory committee," Ofce Basic Energy Sci. s. l. : U.S., Department of Energy, 2008. Available: http://www.science.doe.gov/bes/reports/les/NSSSEF_rpt_print.pdf [5] E. J. Stevenson, B. M. Khouri, Integrated photovoltaic roong component and panel, U.S. Patent 0121267 A1, May 29, 2008. Available: http://www.implu.com/patents/2008-05-29/H/H01/H01L [6] AnonymousA pledge for immediate action, Nature Mater., vol. 8, p. 81, 2009. [7] H. P. Garg, Treatise on Solar Energy, Fundamental of Solar Energy. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 1982. [8] Jo. Dewulf and H. V. Langenhove, Renewables-Based Technology. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley, 2006. [9] G. W. Crabtree and N. S. Lewis, Solar energy conversion, Phys. Today, vol. 60, pp. 3742, 2007. [10] A. R. Jha, Solar Cell Technology and Applications. Boca Raton: Taylor & Francis Group, LLC, 2010. [11] W. Shockley and H. J. Queisser, Detailed balance limit of efciency of p-n junction solar cells, J. Appl. Phys., vol. 32, pp. 510519, 1961. [12] M. C. Beard and R. J. Ellingson, Multiple exciton generation in semiconductor nanocrystals: Toward efcient solar energy conversion, Laser Photon. Rev., vol. 2, pp. 377399, 2008. [13] A. J. Nozik, Spectroscopy and hot electron relaxation dynamics in semiconductor quantum wells and quantum dots, Ann. Rev. Phys. Chem., vol. 52, pp. 193231, 2001. [14] S. Odeh and M. Behnia, Improving photovoltaic module efciency using water cooling, Heat Transfer Eng., vol. 30, pp. 499505, 2009. [15] R. J. Kaplar, D. Kwon, S. A. Ringel, A. A. Allerman, S. R. Kurtz, E. D. Jones, and R. M. Sieg, Deep levels in p- and n-type InGaAsN

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[24] [25] [26] [27] [28] [29] [30] [31] [32]

[33] [34] [35] [36] [37]

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Huiming Yin received the B.E. degree in engineering mechanics from Hohai University, Nanjing, China, in 1995, the M.S. degree in solid mechanics from Peking University, Beijing, China, in 1998, and the Ph.D. degree in structural mechanics and materials from The University of Iowa, Iowa City, in 2004, respectively. He worked on low-temperature cracking of asphalt materials as a Postdoctoral Associate at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, Champaign, during 20042006. Then he moved to California Department Transportation and was engaged in materials engineering and testing services during 20062008. Since 2008, he has been an Assistant Professor in the Department of Civil Engineering and Engineering Mechanics at Columbia University, NY. His research interests focus on sustainable engineering and materials such as energy efcient building, hybrid solar panels, protective coating, and recycled materials.

Dajiang Yang received the B.E. and M.E. degrees in microelectronics from Xian Jiaotong University, Xian, China, in 1997 and 2000, respectively, and the Ph.D. degree in microelectronics from Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, in 2005. From 2004, he was with the Technology Development Division, Charted Semiconductor Manufacturing, focusing on low-k materials and high-stress nitride development. From 2006 to 2010, he has also worked on 130/90/65-nm Logic/RF/NVM technologies with the Integration Technology Development Division, United Microelectronics Corporation, Singapore. Currently, he is with the Department of Civil Engineering and Engineering Mechanics, Columbia University, New York, working on the hybrid solar panel project. His professional interests include nanomaterial synthesis and characterization, Si device and process, and electrical and thermal characterization of sustainable structures.