A multirod solar side-pumping concept is proposed to study the feasibility of multirod/multibeam laser systems in large-sized solar furnaces. This scheme was based on the one-megawatt solar furnace (MWSF) in Odeillo, France, which collected and concentrated solar rays into an input face of a solar homogenizer placed at the focal zone. At its output face, 12 laser heads were positioned, each of which was composed of a two-dimensional compound parabolic concentrator that focused the uniform solar radiation from the homogenizer’s output to an Nd:YAG rod mounted inside a fused silica flow tube. Each laser rod was pumped by one-twelfth of the total concentrated solar power transmitted through the homogenizer, ensuring a good thermal performance under highly concentrated solar power. A 22.84-kW total multimode solar laser power, corresponding to 12.48-W / m2 collection efficiency and 2.28% solar-to-laser power conversion efficiency, was numerically determined. The latter represents an enhancement of 1.75 times over the previous numerically calculated value for a multirod/multibeam laser scheme based on another one-MWSF near Tashkent, Uzbekistan. |
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CITATIONS
Cited by 8 scholarly publications.
Nd:YAG lasers
Solar energy
Rod lasers
Mirrors
Lasers
Optical engineering
Solar radiation