Development of sustainable materials for application in luminescent solar concentrators

• Autor(a) principal: Almeida, Mariana Matos Coimbra de
• Data de Publicação: 2022
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10773/34470
• topic: Luminescent solar concentrators; Sodium carboxymethyl cellulose; Egyptian blue; Europium complexes; DFT

With the increasing demand for and scarcity of non-renewable energy sources it is becoming evident that renewable energy must represent a greater proportion of the worldwide energy portfolio if future power demands are to be met. Though it currently plays a minor role in the energy market, the vast untapped energy from the sun could be used to generate most, if not all, of the world’s energy needs. While the historically high cost of photovoltaic production has hindered its acceptance in the marketplace, developments over the past several years show that the world is on the verge of competitive photovoltaic based solar power. Accordingly, the aim of this project is the development of sustainable materials for application in luminescent solar concentrators. Herein, a sustainable host matrix of carboxymethyl cellulose is envisioned for luminescent solar concentrators, along with Egyptian Blue as the near-infrared luminophore emitter, and a europium complex as a luminophore with emission in the visible region. Towards a deeper understanding of the properties of carboxymethyl cellulose and Egyptian blue, theoretical calculations are performed resorting to density functional theory methods.