Large-area luminescent solar concentrator utilizing donor-acceptor luminophore with nearly zero reabsorption: Indoor/outdoor performance evaluation

Abstract

Luminescent solar concentrators (LSCs) are light-guides doped with luminophores that can spectrally and spatially concentrate solar radiation. With the ability to harvest both direct and diffuse light, LSCs are considered attractive prospects for building-integrated photovoltaic applications. However, it is still challenging to develop organic luminophores based large-area LSCs that work well in various illumination conditions. Reabsorption, caused by small stokes shift of typical organic luminophores, often limits the performance of large-area LSCs. This study reports an indoor and outdoor performance of large-area (≥100 cm2) LSCs that employ a donor-acceptor luminophore with a large Stokes shift. The largest (400 cm2) LSC demonstrates an optical efficiency (ηopt) of 5.5% and 7.6% under outdoor (AM 1.5G) and indoor (white LED) illuminations, respectively. Furthermore, the aesthetic and visual comfort parameters such as chromaticity coordinates, color rendering index, and average visible transmission are obtained that suggest the suitability of our LSCs for a built environment.