A high-performance spectrally-selective solar absorber based on a yttria-stabilized zirconia cermet with high-temperature stability

Cao, Feng; Kraemer, Daniel; Tang, Lu; Li, Yang; Litvinchuk, Alexander P.; Bao, Jiming; Chen, Gang; Ren, Zhifeng

doi:10.1039/C5EE02066B

Title: A high-performance spectrally-selective solar absorber based on a yttria-stabilized zirconia cermet with high-temperature stability

Journal Article · Tue Sep 08 00:00:00 EDT 2015 · Energy & Environmental Science

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1039/C5EE02066B· OSTI ID:1387052

Cao, Feng ^[1]; Kraemer, Daniel ^[2]; Tang, Lu ^[1]; Li, Yang ^[1]; Litvinchuk, Alexander P. ^[1]; Bao, Jiming ^[1]; Chen, Gang ^[2]; Ren, Zhifeng ^[1]

Univ. of Houston, TX (United States)
Massachusetts Inst. of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, MA (United States)

Spectrally-selective solar absorbers are widely used in solar hot water and concentrating solar power (CSP) systems. However, their performance at high temperatures (>450 °C) is still not satisfactory due to high infrared (IR) emittance and lack of long-term thermal stability. In this work, we explore yttria-stabilized zirconia (YSZ) cermet-based spectrally-selective surfaces for high-temperature solar absorber applications. The developed multilayer selective surface comprises two sunlight-absorbing W–Ni–YSZ cermet layers with different W–Ni volume fractions inside the YSZ matrix, two anti-reflection coatings (ARCs), and one tungsten IR reflection layer for reduced IR emittance and improved thermal stability, deposited on a polished stainless steel (SS) substrate. The fabricated solar absorbers are tested for their long-term thermal stability at 600 °C. We find a distinct change in the surface morphology of the solar absorbers when oxygen is highly deficient in the YSZ-ARC layers. The oxygen deficiency can be effectively overcome through increasing the oxygen partial pressure during sputtering, which leads to a stable solar absorber with a solar absorptance of ~0.91 and a total hemispherical emittance of ~0.13 at 500 °C. Those values are obtained at the actual operating temperature using an absolute and direct method that measures the total hemispherical emittance with high accuracy. In contrast, most reports on solar absorber development in the literature to date use only near room-temperature spectroscopy techniques that have been shown to significantly underestimate the total hemispherical emittance. This makes our experimentally demonstrated total hemispherical emittance value the lowest ever reported for a high-temperature stable solar absorber with solar absorptance above 0.9.

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Research Organization:: Energy Frontier Research Centers (EFRC) (United States). Solid-State Solar-Thermal Energy Conversion Center (S3TEC)

Sponsoring Organization:: USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES); National Science Foundation (NSF); Robert A. Welch Foundation

Grant/Contract Number:: SC0001299; FG02-09ER46577; EE0005806; ECCS-1240510; E-1728

OSTI ID:: 1387052

Journal Information:: Energy & Environmental Science, Vol. 8, Issue 10; Related Information: S3TEC partners with Massachusetts Institute of Technology (lead); Boston College; Oak Ridge National Laboratory; Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute; ISSN 1754-5692

Publisher:: Royal Society of ChemistryCopyright Statement

Country of Publication:: United States

Language:: English

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Cited by: 83 works

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Title: A high-performance spectrally-selective solar absorber based on a yttria-stabilized zirconia cermet with high-temperature stability

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