Design and Implementation of High Voltage Photovoltaic Electrolysis System for Solar Fuel Production from CO 2
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Design and Implementation of High Voltage Photovoltaic Electrolysis System for Solar Fuel Production from CO2 Gowri M. Sriramagiri,1,2 Nuha Ahmed,1,2 Wesley Luc,3 Kevin Dobson,2 Steven S. Hegedus,1,2 Feng Jiao,3 and Robert W. Birkmire2,4 1
Dept. Of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Delaware, Newark, DE 19716, U.S.A. 2
3
Institute of Energy Conversion, University of Delaware, Newark, DE 19716, U.S.A.
Dept. of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, University of Delaware, Newark, DE 19716, USA 4
Dept. of Materials Science and Engineering, University of Delaware, Newark, DE 19716, USA
ABSTRACT Growing interest in the use of CO2 as a feedstock for fuel generation has led to increased interest in solar CO2 electrolysis for renewable fuel generation which has a variety of applications ranging from providing renewable sources for energy-dense carbon fuels, to curbing high-density emissions from power plants, industries and automobiles. The challenges of integrated solar-to-carbon fuel converters, where the photovoltaic (PV) material is immersed in the electrolyte, are well-known: the need for unique PV cell designs; material incompatibility; corrosion; and optical losses. In this paper, a PV-electrolysis system is presented, where a flowcell electrolyzer is power-matched to a high-performance solar PV module array which has two system design advantages: 1) use of standard PV cells external to the electrolyzer, which allows de-coupling the design, fabrication and operation of the PV system from that of the electrolyzer; and 2) enabling optimization of the PV configuration to maximize power coupling efficiency to the specific electrolyzer Tafel curve, with or without the use of electronic power-conditioning devices. The implemented system resulted in a peak SFE of 6.5%, a competitive solar-to-fuel efficiency (SFE) figure to those reported in literature. INTRODUCTION Artificial photosynthetic systems have gained popularity in recent times, following significant research efforts in the last four decades for water electrolysis using solar energy. Using renewable energy sources to power the electrolysis of water and CO2 may prove to be an efficient way to realize a sustainable fuel cycle. Solar CO2 electrolysis for renewable carbon fuel generation has a variety of applications ranging from providing renewable sources for energydense carbon fuels, to curbing high-density emissions from power plants, industries, automobiles and the like. The most common architectures used for the implementation of solar electrolysis systems range from the photoelectrochemical cell (PEC) to the photovoltaic electrochemical cell (PVEC), while intermediate topologies between these two opposite ends of the spectrum are also adopted based on the component selection [1]. A PEC has the solar cell, or the ‘photoelectrode’ immersed in the electrolyte, making it a compact, monolithic device [2], whereas a PV-EC has
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