Review on heat conduction, heat convection, thermal radiation and phase change heat transfer of nanofluids in porous media: Fundamentals and applications

Potentials of porous materials for energy management in heat exchangers – A comprehensive review

Conjugate solid-liquid phase change heat transfer in heatsink filled with phase change material-metal foam

Spectral beam splitting (SBS) hybrid PV/T system was a promising path for utilizing the full spectrum solar energy to cogenerate electricity and high-grade heat, with high conversion efficiency To settle the balance between photoelectric and photothermal conversion performance for full spectrum solar energy utilization, the sunlight based on wavelength matching was divided into two or more parts at band-gap wavelength by a spectral beam splitter: sunlight with wavelength at and close to the band-gap of PV cell was directed to generate electricity, while the sunlight with rest wavelength was used for thermal output SBS hybrid PV/T system can not only increase the overall efficiency, but can also decouple the photoelectric and photothermal conversion process in separated operation temperatures The current state-of the-art review on the advancements of SBS hybrid PV/T system performed with the aid of nanofluids, nano-film and semitransparent PV cells was presented in this work, with emphasis on the latest developments during the last decade Mechanisms of different SBS techniques, progress in system, thermodynamic and cost analyses of nanofluids, nano-film and semitransparent PV cell based SBS hybrid PV/T system were discussed in detail to give a comprehensive understanding of the nature of the full spectrum solar energy utilization and the factors impacting on the system efficiency Though the cost increase can be offset by extra energy efficiency gain, the wavelength matching, optical losses and stability of SBS hybrid PV/T system needs to be solved for future industrial application

Progress in full spectrum solar energy utilization by spectral beam splitting hybrid PV/T system

CO2 (dry) reforming of CH4 (DRM) reaction is an attractive measure to not only mitigate the environmental problems such as global warming but also produce the syngas as feedstock for liquid fuel production. Great achievements have been made in various DRM processes such as thermally-driven DRM, plasma-assisted DRM and solar-driven DRM together with the corresponding catalyst design strategies. Herein, the merits and demerits of these three processes as well as these design strategies are compared and analyzed. We start with thermally-driven DRM which accounts for the large majority of researches being reported in the recent five years (2016–2020). Four typical measures to achieve sintering and carbon resistant catalysts including designing catalysts with strong MSI, bimetallic catalysts, layered doubled hydroxide catalysts and core shell structured catalysts are summarized. Thereafter, for plasma-assisted DRM, the effect of operating parameters to the performance of classical plasma reactors as well as the influence of different packing materials for these packed plasma reactors are analyzed. After this, for solar-driven DRM, the application and design of solar reactors are discussed for solar thermocatalysis, which is followed by the discussion of solar photocatalysis and hybrid photothermo catalysis. Finally, we propose potential challenges and research directions of these three processes to give a comprehensive understanding of DRM reaction.

Xue-Wei Yan

Papers

Thermochemical performance of solar driven CO2 reforming of methane in volumetric reactor with gradual foam structure

Heat transfer analysis of a volumetric solar receiver with composite porous structure

Thermal and chemical analysis of methane dry reforming in a volumetric reactor under highly concentrated solar radiation

Transient thermal analysis of the coupled radiative and convective heat transfer in a porous filled tube exchanger at high temperatures