Design and optimization of external light concentrating fixtures for micro-concentrator photovoltaic (μ-CPV) application.

Optoelectronic devices often use external light manipulating optical components which improve the performance of optoelectronic devices without affecting the internal characteristics of the device. In this work, two types of single-unit external light-trapping concentrators are designed using TracePro®, for use in micro-concentrator photovoltaic devices to improve the incident light intensity. The compound concentrator consists of a single standalone light-trapping concentrator placed on top of an optical cage and was designed to be positioned over an individual photovoltaic (PV) cell of < 1 mm dimension. Two types of concentrators have been selected for the investigative studies: hemispherical reflective concentrators and parabolic reflective concentrators. The work also explores the effect of the opening radius of the concentrator that opens to the optical cage. A significantly high light concentration up to ~100X was obtained for the parabolic concentrator. For the PV module type arrangements, where multiple solar cells are connected in series as a strip, the concentrator designs are chosen to be trough type. In trough concentrator case, two designs of cross-sectional shapes were studied: semi-circular and parabolic. The parabolic shaped cross-section of trough concentrator yields ~3 times the light concentration compared with that of the semicylindrical trough concentrator. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]