Characteristics of thermionic energy converter driven by the light irradiation

Abstract

Cesium filled thermionic energy converter (abbreviated as TEC) driven by the light irradiation was investigated in order to use the solar energy as an energy source in future. For the irradiation to the emitter and the plasma in TEC, the electrodes and the structure of TEC have been extremely remodeled. It is found that the emitter could be heated up to 1, 260 K by the irradiation of xenon short arc lamp in stead of solar light, which could produce the cesium plasma with high density at a time. TEC operated at low emitter temperature is expected to draw out a large output current if the negative space charge in front of the emitter can be greatly relaxed. According to the calculation, the plasma produced by the irradiation can contribute to improve the space charge neutrality. The experimental results have shown that the output current of TEC with irradiation increases by 10 times larger than that without the irradiation.