Chip-Scale Solar-Thermal-Electrical Power Generation

• Zhihang Wang¹
• Zhenhua Wu²
• Zhiyu Hu²
• Jessica Orrego-Hernandez¹
• Erzhen Mu³
• Zhao-Yang Zhang⁴
• Martyn Jevric¹
• Yang Liu²
• Xuecheng Fu⁵
• Fengdan Wang⁵
• Tao Li⁴
• Kasper Moth-Poulsen¹

• ¹Chalmers University of Technology - Department of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering
• ²Shanghai Jiao Tong University (SJTU) - National Key Laboratory of Science and Technology on Micro/Nano Fabrication
• ³Henan Polytechnic University - School of Materials Science and Engineering
• ⁴Shanghai Jiao Tong University (SJTU) - Shanghai Key Laboratory of Electrical Insulation and Thermal Aging
• ⁵Shanghai Jiao Tong University (SJTU) - Center for Advanced Electronic, Materials and Devices (AEMD)

Electricity derived from photovoltaics is limited by solar intermittency. Storing solar energy for on-demand power production could address this challenge. Here, we combined both solution- and neat film-based molecular solar thermal (MOST) systems, where solar energy can be stored as chemical energy and released as heat, with microfabricated thermoelectric generators (MEMS-TEG) to produce electricity when solar radiation is not available. The novel small-scale hybrid integrated devices demonstrated continuous power densities of up to 1.3 W·m-3 by storing solar energy in Sweden then releasing heat and generating electricity in China. Our results show that, the proof-of-principle on a small scale and independent of time and geographical restrictions, opportunities exist for local solar energy storage and power production beyond traditional photovoltaic-electrochemical cell technologies.

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