Organic dyes in PMMA in a planar luminescent solar collector: a performance evaluation

The performance of organic dyes in PMMA has been evaluated in a three-layer planar luminescent solar concentrator. The single plate and combined three-plate efficiencies have been measured for a number of dyes, and results of one typical combination are reported here. A detailed characterization of the spectroscopic properties of the dye molecules as well as the device dependent and device independent parameters of the plates allow comparison between measured and predicted efficiency. Our results demonstrate the presence of a significant positive synergism for the multilayer device.