SBIR Phase II: Research and development of production-scale high-efficiency Thermal Photovoltaic (TPV) cells to enable ultra-low cost energy storage.

小型企业创新研究(SBIR)第二阶段项目的更广泛影响/商业潜力是通过太阳能电池产生廉价、可靠的电力。随着风能和太阳能等可再生能源为国内发电提供了一种新的低成本手段，能够将这些间歇性能源转化为可调度能源的储能系统越来越具有商业吸引力。然而，传统的储能技术，如先进的电池，不能提供所需的恢复能力，例如在几天的时间尺度上。超低成本的存储技术，例如那些基于地球上丰富的材料中的热能存储的技术，有可能抓住这一巨大的商业机会。拟议中的项目将推动一种新型热机的开发，将热能转化为电能。拟议的项目旨在将这种热光伏(TPV)热机从实验室推向市场。该项目的目标是利用工业设备和大面积衬底来发展这些电池的大规模和高产制造。拟议的项目将探索高性价比交易空间，以实现光伏材料的大批量生产。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并已通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II project is to generate inexpensive, reliable electricity through solar cells. As renewables such as wind and solar provide a new low-cost means of generating power domestically, energy storage systems capable of transforming these intermittent sources into dispatchable ones are increasingly commercially attractive. However, conventional energy storage technologies, such as advanced batteries, cannot provide the needed resiliency of on the length scale of days. Ultra-low-cost storage technologies, such as those based on thermal energy storage in earth-abundant materials, have the potential to address this large commercial opportunity. The proposed project will advance the development of a new type of heat engine to convert heat into electricity. The proposed project aims to move this thermophotovoltaic (TPV) heat engine from the lab to the market. The goal of this project is to develop large-scale and high-yield manufacturing of these cells with industrial equipment and large-area substrates. The proposed project will explore the cost-performance trade space toward the goal of high-volume production of PV material.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.