SBIR Phase I: Radiative Sky Cooling-Enhanced Refrigeration System

SBIR第一阶段项目旨在大幅减少冷却和制冷系统的电力消耗。冷却系统消耗了美国近10%的电力。在夏季，最需要冷却和制冷系统，但也是效率最低的时候。这给我国电网造成了巨大压力。通过提高冷却系统的效率，公用事业规模所需的电力将减少，特别是在高峰时段和夏季。此外，商业冷却系统的运营商可以减少其总体电费支出，增加其收入和利润。项目？会议的成果还将为提高冷却系统的效率开辟一条道路，而不涉及使用日益稀缺的淡水资源，并最终可能导致最大规模的水效率更高的冷却系统。最后，该项目的方法是利用可再生资源，即天空，这是目前尚未开发的冷却源。正在提出的技术创新利用可再生资源，即天空，通过称为辐射天空冷却的机制，大大提高冷却系统的效率。通过使用专门的光学表面，将热量作为热辐射排向天空，同时反射几乎所有入射的太阳光，可以每天24小时被动地冷却到空气温度以下。在该项目中，将开发一种包含这种表面的制冷系统，目的是证明比传统系统更高的效率。在这个过程中没有水蒸发，唯一需要的电力是抽水。此外，还将进行建模，以了解如何扩展这样的系统，以便在更大的部署中使用。最后，
第一阶段项目是一个大规模部署变革性清洁能源技术的途径，用于提高冷却系统的效率。

This SBIR Phase I project seeks to significantly reduce the electricity consumed by cooling and refrigeration systems. Cooling systems consume nearly 10% of the electricity generated in the United States. During summer months, cooling and refrigeration systems are needed the most, but are also when they are the least efficient. This results in a significant strain on our nation's electricity grid. By improving the efficiency of cooling systems, less electricity will be needed at the utility scale, particularly during peak hours and in the summer. Furthermore, operators of commercial cooling systems could reduce their overall electricity expenses and increase their revenues and profits. The project?s outcomes will also create a pathway to improve the efficiency of cooling systems that does not involve the use of increasingly scarce freshwater resources, and could eventually lead to more water-efficient cooling systems at the largest scales. Finally, this project's approach harnesses renewable resource, the sky, which is source of cooling that is currently untapped.The technical innovation being proposed harnesses a renewable resource, the sky, through a mechanism known as radiative sky cooling, to dramatically improve the efficiency of cooling systems. By using specialized optical surfaces that reject heat as thermal radiation to the sky, while simultaneously reflecting nearly all incident sunlight, it is possible to passively cool below the air temperature 24 hours a day. In this project, a refrigeration system incorporating such surfaces will be developed with the aim of demonstrating improved efficiency over conventional systems. In this process no water is evaporated and the only electricity needed is for pumping. Furthermore, modeling will be performed to understand how such a system could be scaled up for use in larger deployments. At the end of the
Phase I project, a pathway towards large-scale deployment of a transformative clean energy technology, used to improve the efficiency of cooling systems, will be demonstrated.