Abstract
Solar cells are gradually becoming a common substitute for fossil fuels in order to address the escalating energy crisis and environmental change. Many wearable or outdoor electronic devices are powered by portable solar cells, but due to structural limitations and dramatic increases in heat dissipation, portable solar cell efficiency declines sharply with heat accumulation and temperature rises, and thermal non-uniformity reduces device reliability. An efficient thermal management solution is needed to address these crucial thermal issues. In this study, a novel composite PCM with efficiently enhanced thermal conductivity (ETC-PCM) has been created using graphene, epoxy resin (EP), and polyethylene glycol (PEG) by strong cross-linking and thermally induced structural rearrangement. Compared to the composite PCM with normally enhanced thermal conductivity (NTC-PCM) by traditional mechanical mixing, enhancements are made to ETC-PCM's cutability, flexibility, and latent heat. More significantly, the thermal conductivity of ETC-PCM increased by 157% to 0.51 W/m·K with the inclusion of a 1.5% effective thermal conductivity filler component. In a composite PV system with direct integration of flexible solar cells and ETC-PCM, the ETC-PCM also exhibited superior thermal management in both time and space dimensions, with enhanced thermal uniformity and long-term reliability of the PV system. The outstanding thermal and mechanical properties of ETC-PCM have shown tremendous potential in many applications, such as solar cell thermal management, solar/electric energy harvesting, thermal energy storage, etc. • A novel PEG/EP/graphene composite PCM with efficiently enhanced thermal conductivity was fabricated. • ETC-PCM was synthesized with strong cross-linking and thermally induced structural rearrangement. • Both long-term reliability and thermal uniformity of normal or aged PV-PCM systems were investigated.
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