An Emerging Energy Technology: Self-Uninterrupted Electricity Power Harvesting from the Sun and Cold Space

Harvesting sustainable energy from the sun and cold space to uninterruptedly generate green electricity provides a potential alternative way to solve the unfolding energy crisis and environmental issues. This emerging energy technology is seeing important progress and further advances remain challenging. Herein, the underlying principle, thermodynamic limit, and global potential of this technology are comprehensively reviewed. The recent advances of energy harvesters (solar absorbers or/and radiative coolers) integrated with energy converters (thermoelectric generators) are summarized, and strategies including thermal/optical/radiative cooling concentration, thermal dissipation, and geometric optimization are discussed. Last, the great prospects for uninterrupted energy harvest and electricity generation in extensive fields are outlined, and the scientific and engineering challenges for upcoming growth are proposed.

Automated summary

Harvesting sustainable energy from the sun and cold space to generate green electricity uninterruptedly offers a potential alternative solution to the current energy crisis and environmental issues. This emerging energy technology has made significant progress, but more challenges lie ahead.