Research On The Thermophotovoltaic System

By using the thermo-photovoltaic (TPV) technology, thermal radiation can be converted into electricity through photovoltaic cells. The advantages of TPV include the wide range of heat sources and the potentially high power density outputs, which indicate that the potential market for TPV applications is very large. In this paper, the output electric power and power generation efficiency of the TPV system are improved by optimizing the performance of individual components in a thermophotovoltaic power generation device.In order to improve the performance of emitter, four groups of radiant burns are designed and study in the first part.Through comparing burning adequacy and the parameters such as the surface temperature of emitter,radiant power density,radiant efficiency, the paper determine a set of optimal radiant burn.Proposing improved method on the basis of the original regenerative system 1 and discussing the effect of various fin structure on heat transfer and friction characteristics of the regenerator,considering with manufacturability and machining economics,the paper design the regenerative system 2.The parameters such as temperature of air-inlet and flue-gas-outlet, heat resistance,exchange heat,and heat transfer efficiency of the two regenerative systems are tested and compared, the regenerative system 2 is modeled with FLUENT.It is show that, the results of numerical simulation accord with experimental results,the performance of the regenerative system 2 is better than the regenerative system 1, the regenerative system 2 improve effectively the output electric power and power generation efficiency of the TPV system.For the imperfect of the straight-flow watercooling system,the paper re-design the spiral-flow watercooling system after checking calculation with FLUENT. Experimental results show that the spiral-flow watercooling system'heat-flux surface temperature is lower, corresponding short circuit current and open circuit voltage of TPV cell has been effectively improved. The numerical simulation of heat-transfer and flow performance of the spiral-flow watercooling system is operated in virtue of FLUENT software,and the results show that temperature of heat-flux surface and loss of flow resistance close to the experimental values.The effect of of various water-leading plate and fin structure on heat transfer and friction characteristics are analyzed through numerical method mentioned above. The paper also presents some improved methods which taking into account the shortage of original longitudinal-fins air cooling system. After the effect of the fin structure changes on the heat transfer and flow characteristic of the heat sink are been analyzed with FLUENT,a new bended bifid-ribs air cooling system is then fabricated by coupling manufacturability and machining economics. Meanwhile, the heat sink's heat-flux surface temperature variation curve with the fan power changes at different radiator temperature are given by the experiments of the two air cooling systems. The size of the heat flux surface temperature,output short circuit current and the open circuit voltage of the TPV cell are been compared while the both systems are in same conditions, the performance of the improved bended bifid-ribs air cooling system as well as the effect to the TPV power output are all been discussed.Finally,The trend of short circuit current and open circuit voltage was analyzed under different combustion condition and system output electric power and power generation efficiency was calculated while the TPV system respectively based on blackbody emietter and selective emitter.