Fiber-optic solar energy transmission and concentration

Fiber-optic solar energy transmission and concentration provide a flexible way of handling concentrated solar energy. The high flux solar energy transmission by a flexible fiber-optic bundle and the research on the associated compound parabolic concentrator will largely expand the existing field of applications of solar energy concentrators. We report on a flexible light guide which consists of 19 optical fibers and is capable of transmitting up to 60 W of optical power, with 60% efficiency. A flexible fiber-optic solar energy transmission and concentration scheme by using one single fiber, 2 and 7 fiber bundles is also reported. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.