Rodolphe Vaillon, CNRS Professor (CETHIL, France) and Visiting Scholar in the Department (2016 and 2017), publishes with Dr. Olivier Dupré (CETHIL, France and currently at the PV-Lab, EPFL, Switzerland) and Prof. Martin A. Green (ACAP, UNSW, Australia), a book with Springer providing a comprehensive introduction on the thermal issues in photovoltaics.
The book is the result of years of research dedicated to answering simple questions such as: why does temperature negatively affect the efficiency of most photovoltaic systems? Is it possible to engineer the temperature sensitivities of solar cells? What can be done to minimize their operating temperatures?
Throughout the book, it is argued that the design of solar cells, but also thermophotovoltaic devices, can be optimized by taking their thermal behavior and operating conditions into consideration. Models and concepts to guide researchers and engineers towards the development of this kind of optimization are provided. In particular, the conversion losses induced by temperature, the concept of temperature coefficient and the phenomena driving the equilibrium temperature of photovoltaic devices, are presented in detail.
Rodolphe Vaillon acknowledges the financial support (W.W. Clyde Visiting Chair award) from the College of Engineering at the University of Utah.