Solution‐Processed All‐Ceramic Plasmonic Metamaterials for Efficient Solar–Thermal Conversion over 100–727 °C

Abstract

 ε 100 C of 4-10%, as well as thermal stability below 500 °C, [9,10,14-17] which can hardly satisfy the requirements of Low-cost and large-area solar-thermal absorbers with superior spectral selectivity and excellent thermal stability are vital for efficient and large-scale solar-thermal conversion applications, such as space heating, desalination, ice mitigation, photothermal catalysis, and concentrating solar power. Few state-of-the-art selective absorbers are qualified for both low-(<200 °C) and high-temperature (>600 °C) applications due to insufficient spectral selectivity or thermal stability over a wide temperature range. Here, a high-performance plasmonic metamaterial selective absorber is developed by facile solutionbased processes via assembling an ultrathin (≈120 nm) titanium nitride (TiN) nanoparticle film on a TiN mirror. Enabled by the synergetic in-plane plasmon and out-of-plane Fabry-Pérot resonances, the all-ceramic plasmonic metamaterial simultaneously achieves high, full-spectrum solar absorption (95%), low mid-IR emission (3% at 100 °C), and excellent stability over a temperature range of 100-727 °C, even outperforming most vacuum-deposited absorbers at their specific operating temperatures. The competitive performance of the solution-processed absorber is accompanied by a significant cost reduction compared with vacuum-deposited absorbers. All these merits render it a cost-effective, universal solution to offering high efficiency (89-93%) for both low-and high-temperature solar-thermal applications.

2D MXenes: the lowest-emissivity black materials

“…3a. The metamaterial absorber only offers a low of 45%, much lower than the values (~95%) on dense substrates 3 . In contrast, the intrinsic Ti 3 C 2 T x sustained its high of 85% and low of 25% even on highly porous membranes (Fig.…”

“…Porous structures are indispensable components to a lot of solar-thermal applications, such as steam generation 1 , seawater desalination 39 , and smart textiles 45 . However, current high-performance selective solar absorbers are usually realized by constructing arti cial metamaterials/metasurfaces in nanoscale (multilayer nano lms or nanophotonic structures) on dense at substrates [2][3][4]24,26 , which will lose their effectiveness when coated on porous substrates owing to the break of resonant conditions. For instance, we coated a previously reported high-performance metamaterial absorber (Ag lm/TiN nanoparticles/SiO 2 ) on a highly porous Nylon 66 membrane shown in the inset of Fig.…”

“…For instance, in solar-thermal energy conversion systems, to maximize the conversion e ciency, ideal solar absorbing black materials should show perfect absorption over the solar spectrum (0.3-2.5 μm), but simultaneously ultralow mid-IR absorption/emission (2.5-20 μm) to suppress enormous re-radiative heat dissipation (e.g. 0.68 kW m -2 @ 100 °C, 0.68 sun), known as selective solar absorption [1][2][3][4]9 . Intuitively,…”

“…Due to the lack of intrinsic materials with satisfactory spectral selectivity in nature, great efforts have been made in designing subwavelength metamaterials or metasurfaces with exotic optical properties through various light manipulation strategies, including photonic crystals 23,24 , plasmon resonances 3,4,25 , and interference effects [26][27][28][29] . However, there are several limitations in these arti cial low-emissivity absorbers based on structural engineering in nanoscale.…”

Ultra-Broadband Refractory All-Metal Metamaterial Selective Absorber for Solar Thermal Energy Conversion

“…Since Landy et al first experimentally demonstrated metamaterial absorbers (MMA) in 2008 [ 1 ], MMA has spurred the interest of many researchers due to its extensive application value, e.g., solar–thermal conversion [ 2 , 3 , 4 ], photovoltaic [ 5 ], plasmonic sensors [ 6 , 7 , 8 ], imaging [ 9 , 10 ], stray light elimination [ 11 ], thermal emitter [ 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 ], photodetectors [ 16 ], and so on. In recent years, various light-matter interaction mechanisms are implemented to achieve strong light absorption, such as surface plasmon polariton [ 17 , 18 ], LSPP [ 19 ], magnetic polarization [ 20 ], and Fabry–Pérot cavity [ 21 ].…”