Abstract
In the present work we quantify the light intensity reaching the side
faces of an externally-coated, rectangular luminescent solar concentrator,
and the facets of a cylindrical one. Ray-tracing is used: an analytical model
has been constructed and discretized. The main novelties reside in the attribution
of a finite thickness and attenuation coefficient to the external layer, and
in the comparison between two geometries that have been measured against each
other only in the homogeneous limit so far. In previous studies the external
material is usually treated as infinitely thin. A physical thickness allows,
instead, to calculate the ray-paths, to quantify the absorption losses and
to evaluate the efficiency of the concentrator as function of the external
layer depth. A set of numerical experiments has been performed, in order to
evaluate the efficiency of the concentrator when the thickness and material
properties of the outer layer are changed, and to compare the performance
of the rectangular to the one of the cylindrical device under various conditions.
Qualitatively we find the bilayer device to have greater optical efficiency
than a comparable homogenous version. For the cylindrical geometry the factor
of improvement over the homogenous device is more strongly dependent on both
the thickness and the attenuation of the luminescent layer than for the rectangular
geometry.
© 2013 IEEE
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