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The key to harnessing the sun’s power reliably can be found in Pyron Solar’s unique and proprietary 20kWp DC CPV generating system with dual axis solar tracking. The system is comprised of one 20 kWp DC floating array whose tracking system in azimuth is driven by a single small 12 Volt DC motor. One array is 15 meters diameter. Pyron has the lowest profile dual axis tracking system in the industry, and accomplishes this by nesting its modules, ideally spaced, on a floating ring array.
HE Optics System
Sunlight first meets the HE Optics System at its specially designed and patented, short focal-length, acrylic concentrating lens. As the rays pass through the lens, the light reflects and refracts, raising the sunlight concentration to 6,500 suns on a small pinpoint of light. A specially designed and manufactured glass body, a secondary optic takes the 6,500 sun pinpoint and spreads out the concentrated solar flux so that the sun’s energy is deposited evenly on the small substrate based multi-junction cell at 1,200 sun concentration.
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solar tracking:
Regardless of season or time of day, Pyron Solar efficiently tracks the sun. A platform with multiple arrays, floating close to each other in shallow, evaporation-retardant water, rotate around its vertical axis with the azimuthal travel of the sun. A special gear activates a linkage to allow each floating module to track solar elevation by tilting up and down as needed. The linkage is powered by a small 12-watt motor, the same size used in children’s toys.
passive heat transfer to water:
Competing concentrator PV designs suffer from a very narrow operating window due to wind speed. These air cooled systems require a certain amount of wind speed to cool efficiently, yet their cantilevered design suffers from wind loading restrictions that require them to shut down in winds of fairly low velocity (approximately 30 MPH). Conversely, if the wind speed is too low with these systems, they suffer efficiency losses in the PV cells due to high temperatures. In contrast, the Pyron System is passively water cooled, and water is far more efficient as a heat transfer medium than ambient air, and the power generated will exceed the power of otherwise equivalent air-cooled concentrating PV systems due to lower cell operating temperatures.
