Published in

Nature Research, Nature Communications, 1(8), 2017

DOI: 10.1038/s41467-017-01618-w

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Dynamic tuning of optical absorbers for accelerated solar-thermal energy storage

This paper is made freely available by the publisher.
This paper is made freely available by the publisher.

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Abstract

AbstractCurrently, solar-thermal energy storage within phase-change materials relies on adding high thermal-conductivity fillers to improve the thermal-diffusion-based charging rate, which often leads to limited enhancement of charging speed and sacrificed energy storage capacity. Here we report the exploration of a magnetically enhanced photon-transport-based charging approach, which enables the dynamic tuning of the distribution of optical absorbers dispersed within phase-change materials, to simultaneously achieve fast charging rates, large phase-change enthalpy, and high solar-thermal energy conversion efficiency. Compared with conventional thermal charging, the optical charging strategy improves the charging rate by more than 270% and triples the amount of overall stored thermal energy. This superior performance results from the distinct step-by-step photon-transport charging mechanism and the increased latent heat storage through magnetic manipulation of the dynamic distribution of optical absorbers.