3 ms·

For those of us unfamiliar with the properties of these materials, what would be considered impressive? Are there examples that are better?

• mnw21cam 3y ago
  If you have a heat source with a temperature of 2500C, then the theoretical maximum efficiency of conversion is around 89% assuming you have a heat sink available that can stay below 30C. (1.0 - (30+273)/(2500+273) = 0.89). All heat engines will be worse than this because of practicalities, but a real steam turbine system can be around 47% efficient and a combined cycle can be 60% efficient, using a cooler "hot" end than 2500C. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_efficiency https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_efficiency
  • _hypx_ 3y ago
    Which is the problem of the idea. Any kind of thermal engine, such as a stirling engine, would beat this idea in efficiency with those kinds of temperatures.
  • magicalhippo 3y ago
    For photovoltaic cells there are other factors which limits this further. For a single p-n junction the limit is around 33% for normal sunlight[1], though it's too early in the morning for me to calculate it at the proposed ~2700K temperature. By stacking junctions you can get higher but then other things kick in[2]. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shockley%E2%80%93Queisser_limit https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shockley%E2%80%93Queisser_limi... [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar-cell_efficiency#Factors_affecting_energy_conversion_efficiency https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar-cell_efficiency#Factors_...