Analysis of solar thermophotovoltaic test data from experiments performed at McDonnell Douglas

Solar thermophotovoltaic power systems offer potentially high system efficiency for solar energy to electrical energy conversion and attractive system advantages. McDonnell Douglas Corporation (MDC) has been investigating this technology for both space and terrestrial applications for several years. A testbed prototype was designed, built, and tested on a 90 kW_t dish concentrator at the MDA solar test facility. Twelve experiments were conducted with absorber temperatures in excess of 1300 °C being achieved using only a fraction of the reflected power from the 90 kW_t dish concentrator. This paper discusses the solar thermophotovoltaic testbed prototype unit, test data, and presents an analysis of the unit’s performance. A combination of analytical analysis and test data is used to obtain an understanding of the system and subsystem performance. The preliminary results of these tests and analysis indicate a solar thermophotovoltaic power system can achieve high system performance. Furthermore, system demonstrations are possible utilizing a combination of current off‐the‐shelf hardware components and components currently being tested in laboratories.