FRESNEL LENSES BASED ON NANO SHELL-SILVER COATED SILICA ARRAY FOR SOLAR CELLS APPLICATIONS

Taha A. Elwi, Hussain M. Al-Rizzo
2011 Progress in Electromagnetics Research B  
Fresnel lenses are low-cost optical elements used for focusing sunlight to solar panels to ensure operation under highflux density. However, the conventional Fresnel lens has a relatively high material usage and hence contributes to additional efficiency degradation. Moreover, traditional design of Fresnel lenses introduces additional prismatic facets, due to deviations in manufacturing, which reflect the light toward the back focal spot, leading to additional losses. In this paper, Fresnel
more » ... es based on finite arrays of Nano Shell-Silver Coated Silica (NSSCS) are proposed to overcome the aforementioned drawbacks from infrared regime through the visible band to the ultraviolet region. To identify reflection losses, material losses of the NSSCS array and rejection bands due to the NSSCS array arrangement, three unique electromagnetic (EM) approaches are invoked: Frequency Selective Surfaces (FSS) to determine reflection bands, Metamaterial (MTM) to specify material losses and Electromagnetic Band Gap (EBG) to locate the rejection band. The EM characteristics of the NSSCS array are evaluated for wavelengths ranging from 0.3 µm to 300 µm, using CST MicroWave Studio (CST MWS), which is based on the Finite Integration Technique (FIT). It is found that the NSSCS array exhibits excellent transmittance within two bands, one from 545 nm to 857 nm and the other from 444.5 nm to 480 nm, for angles ranging from 0 • to 180 • along the azimuth and elevation. The effective refractive index (n eff ) spectra showed that the NSSCS array does not provide a negative for its real (n eff ) part over the considered wavelength band. The imaginary part of (n eff ) value is found to be almost insignificant, between 0.857 µm to 1.714 µm and 316 nm to 414 nm and lossy elsewhere. In general, the NSSCS array shows no specific stop band over the considered frequency
doi:10.2528/pierb11061309 fatcat:kiop2b5ztvbdlna7xxjlozexou