Passive Daytime Radiative Cooling Technologies for the Decarbonisation of Cooling in Electric Vehicles and the Built Environment

Project ID: 2531ad1535

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Research Theme: Energy and Decarbonisation

UCL Lead department: Electronic and Electrical Engineering (EEE)

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Lead Supervisor: Ioannis Papakonstantinou

Project Summary:

A key objective of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals is to attain Good Health and Well Being for all citizens in the World by 2030. Space cooling is a fundamental means for achieving this goal due to its direct correlation with human comfort, increased productivity levels and concomitant health benefits. Nonetheless, cooling is one of the most energy intensive and highly polluting processes associated with human activity. An influential report published in 2018 by the International Energy Agency (IEA) stated that powerful socioeconomic drivers like global warming, increasing population, growing income per capita and rapid urbanization will inflate demand for cooling to unsustainable levels, exceeding 6,200 TWh per year by 2050. One of the most prominent solutions to address the cooling conundrum is via harnessing the mid-infrared (MIR) atmospheric transparency window. Heat can freely escape through the atmosphere, offering the unique prospect of converting the cold Universe into an inexhaustible heatsink for the thermal radiation emitted by the built and transport environments on Earth. Radiative cooling technologies that leverage the above principles have gained significant momentum recently. The key benefits of these technologies are that they meet the dual target for energy and carbon free operation combined with short payback times. In this project, we will use advanced nanophotonic designs, to develop nanostructures that simultaneously reject solar radiation, while exhibiting strong thermal emission within the atmospheric heat transparency window with materials and processes that are green, can withstand harsh weather conditions and are industrially compatible. In this way, we will produce a sustainable, scalable and robust passive cooling technology with enormous potential that can be used reliably in both automotive and building sectors.