Nonimaging Fresnel Lenses Design and Performance of Solar Concentrators

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We have written a book! On Fresnel lenses in general, and on nonimaging Fresnel lenses for solar concentration in particular:

Ralf Leutz, Akio Suzuki (2001)
Nonimaging Fresnel Lenses: Design and Performance of Solar Concentrators
Springer Verlag Heidelberg
ISBN 3-540-41841-5
ISSN 0342-4111

The book can be ordered on the web using Springer Verlag's catalogue search at www.springer.de. Specifically, if you are resident in the Americas:  http://www.springer-ny.com/detail.tpl?ISBN=3540418415.
For all other countries: http://www.springer.de/cgi-bin/search_book.pl?isbn=3-540-41841-5.

Our book is conveniently available at http://www.amazon.com, search for 'leutz fresnel', and can be found in selected Tokyo bookstores, too. Ordering directly from Germany will probably be the cheapest option.

We maintain a page where you can submit your comments! You can read what other people had to say about the book. This page also contains a list of known errata.

Nonimaging Fresnel Lenses Design and Performance of Solar Concentrators 2001. XI, 272 pp. 139 figs., 44 tabs. Hardcover Recommended Retail Price: DM 139,90 (in the USA US$ 79.95, in Japan 12,000Yen) This book offers a detailed and comprehensive account of the engineering of the world's first nonimaging Fresnel lens solar concentrator. The book closes a gap in solar concentrator design, and describes nonimaging refractive optics and its numerical mathematics . The contents follow a systems approach that is absent in standard handbooks of optics or solar energy. The reader is introduced to the principles, theories, and advantages of nonimaging optics from the standpoint of concentrating sunlight (the solar concentrator idea). The book shows the reader how to find his or her own optical solution using the rules and  methodologies covering the design and the assessment of the nonimaging lens. This novel solar concentrator is developed within the natural constraints presented by the sun and in relation to competitive solutions offered by other concentrators.

Table of Contents
 

1 Lenses and Mirrors for Solar Energy

Photovoltaic or Thermal Concentration?

Classification of Solar Concentrators

2 Nonimaging Optics

Nonimaging Concentration

Generalized Ideal Concentration

Lagrange Invariant

Nonimaging Mirrors

3 Fresnel Lens Optics

Reflection and Refraction

Total Internal Reflection

Deviation

Refractive Indices

Minimum Dispersion

4 Earlier Fresnel Lenses

History of Fresnel Lenses

Recent Developments

Simple Fresnel Lenses

Domed and Arched Fresnel Lenses

5 Nonimaging Fresnel Lens Design

Nonimaging Design

The Optimum Linear Lens

Rotational Symmetry

Arbitrary Shapes

Diverger Lens for Lighting

6 Lens Evaluation

Losses

Transmittance

Geometrical Losses

Concentration Ratios

Nonideal Concentration

7 Optimization of Stationary Concentrators

Choice of Stationary Collector

Solar Radiation Model

Radiation on a Tilted Plate

Acceptance by a Solar Concentrator

Compound Parabolic Concentrators

Quasi-3D Concentrators

8 Prototype Design, Manufacturing and Testing

Prototypes of Choice

Prism Size

Lens Redesign

Lens Manufacturing

Sample

Preliminary Tests

Partial Absorber Illumination

Tracking

9 Concentrated Sunlight and Photovoltaic Conversion

Flux Density

Solar Disk Size and Brightness

Spectral Colour Dispersion

Silicon Concentrator Cells

Multijunction Devices

Photovoltaic System Performance

Concentration and Cost

10 Solar Thermal Concentrator Systems

Solar Resources

Solar Sorption Air Conditioning

Energy and Exergy

Exergy of a Concentrating Collector

11 Solar Concentration in Space

Space Concentrator Arrays

Design Challenges in Space

Lenses and Mirrors!

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Ralf Leutz Physics Department Philipps-University 35037 Marburg, Germany phone +49-6421-2824148 fax +49-6421-2826535  email ralfsun@yahoo.com http://geocities.datacellar.net/ralfsun

Akio Suzuki UNESCO Natural Sciences Sector 1, rue Miollis 75732 Paris Cedex 15 France email a.suzuki@unesco.org