thermophotovoltaics: part 1

[@DDDelgado]

3:20 he says converter and the sun are black bodies.

[@pidousuon2019]

is that requires only the sunlight or any light that contains heat along? Or just heat with normal bright of the daylight is also able to converting as well?

[@klausbrinck2137]

Any infrared light, but the only source without a big part of it being conduction-compartible-heat (but solely convection-compartible-heat), is the sun. All other sources that come to mind, produce a majority of their heat, that´s tranferable only by conduction (direct contact to the hot surface), which should not be wasted !!!

[@trupalpatil1861]

Sir after absorber, the filter that we are using. why is it filtering the higher energy photons and not the lower ones?

[@klausbrinck2137]

The pv-cell functions with infrared, so, low energy photons. The hi energy photons are recycled, and the quality of their energy deteriorates thereby, thus turning to low energy photons, which the pv-cell can now use. it works just with low quality energy, which is very fortunate! the best would be to heat the absorber with a flame! I suppose it´s more efficient than diesel or stirling generators...

[@robertrichard2322]

@@klausbrinck2137 What about heating with a helium cooled nuclear reactor able to reach temperatures of about 1800-1900 degrees C? Instead of using that same reactor to make steam for a steam turbine...

[@klausbrinck2137]

@@robertrichard2322 My diesel-flame-idea was stupid to begin with, cause you´d need heat by convection (infrared waves traveling through a transparent mediom, such as air or vacuum), and not heat by conduction (contact to the hot surface), so, both ideas would have considerable loses, competing with very expensive, but also 99% efficient steam-turbines... The calculation, which method would win, is difficult... But maybe still better than Pertier-elements, that function with conduction and are very unefficient... Sorry, but I don´t even remember the whole content of this video, in order to judge... It´s too long ago...

[@robertrichard2322]

@@klausbrinck2137 No worries, I just have a thought of a micro nuclear reactor, encapsulated by thermophotovoltaic cells transforming the heat from that reaction directly to electricity, having a hard time researching it though as I haven't come across anyone who has done it. The benefit in my mind, and I'm sure it isn't this simple, would be that there are no moving parts thus no maintenance, no damage, no oil, little to no cooling, just pure electricity generation other than maybe cleaning off the TPVs The efficiency isn't really that important, as long as you get a decent output, as you could have a device kicking out electricity on its own for years potentially I have found betavoltaics which takes light from a nuclear reaction and uses photovoltaic cells to make electricity but it is extremely low output

[@klausbrinck2137]

@@robertrichard2322 You are right about the benefits. But one should find a source, that´s able to be exploited by extracting its heat-energy through conduction AND convection at the same time (never let one of those 2 simply get wasted), and that´s uneasy. The sun, on the other side, its heat can be exploited only by convection, and is as such, predestined for usage in combination with this invention...