| NSF Org: |
TI Translational Impacts |
| Recipient: |
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| Initial Amendment Date: | December 23, 2017 |
| Latest Amendment Date: | December 23, 2017 |
| Award Number: | 1746140 |
| Award Instrument: | Standard Grant |
| Program Manager: |
Rick Schwerdtfeger
TI Translational Impacts TIP Directorate for Technology, Innovation, and Partnerships |
| Start Date: | January 1, 2018 |
| End Date: | June 30, 2019 (Estimated) |
| Total Intended Award Amount: | $224,997.00 |
| Total Awarded Amount to Date: | $224,997.00 |
| Funds Obligated to Date: |
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| History of Investigator: |
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| Recipient Sponsored Research Office: |
1832 TRIBUTE RD SACRAMENTO CA US 95815-4309 (916)226-1763 |
| Sponsor Congressional District: |
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| Primary Place of Performance: |
1832 Tribute Road, Suite C Sacramento CA US 95815-4309 |
| Primary Place of
Performance Congressional District: |
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| Unique Entity Identifier (UEI): |
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| Parent UEI: |
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| NSF Program(s): | SBIR Phase I |
| Primary Program Source: |
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| Program Reference Code(s): |
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| Program Element Code(s): |
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| Award Agency Code: | 4900 |
| Fund Agency Code: | 4900 |
| Assistance Listing Number(s): | 47.084 |
ABSTRACT
The broader impact/commercial potential of this Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project is in enabling additional energy savings in buildings by harvesting natural daylight and using it for illuminating the interior space with high efficiency and without glare, thus offsetting the need for electrical lighting. This will make building operations more sustainable and help improve the energy security of the U.S, create jobs, and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Additionally, when commercially available, this new technology will bring all of the well-known benefits of enhanced natural lighting for occupants of millions of residential and commercial buildings across the U.S., such as connection to outdoors and improved comfort, productivity and well-being, thus benefiting many groups of consumers.
The proposed project will demonstrate the feasibility of a novel, non-prismatic optical film material and its use for enhanced daylighting harvesting in buildings. This material employs thousands of microscopic reflective surfaces embedded into the bulk of the material and operates by capturing the incident sunlight and projecting it deep into the building interior. Commercial buildings alone consume about 20 percent of all energy used in the United States at an estimated cost of nearly $180 billion. Building interior lighting accounts for around 30% of that cost. By applying the daylight-harvesting optical material to windows of building facades, a significant fraction of that energy consumption can be offset using the natural light captured throughout the day. The project will provide the critical design, testing, and experimental validation needed to transition the technology into the commercial sector. The primary objective of the project is to develop the core light-redirecting material and associated micro-optical fabrication technology that can be subsequently scaled for low-cost mass production. A second objective is to develop, test and demonstrate a prototype daylight-harvesting window film product based on this material.
PROJECT OUTCOMES REPORT
Disclaimer
This Project Outcomes Report for the General Public is displayed verbatim as submitted by the Principal Investigator (PI) for this award. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this Report are those of the PI and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation; NSF has not approved or endorsed its content.
Advanced daylighting by capturing the natural sunlight at the windows and redirecting it deep into the space is an effective strategy for reducing the energy use and improving occupants' comfort in building. Creating light redirecting fenestration products that would satisfy the stringent market requirements for the low cost, ease of installation, sufficiently high light throughput, glare prevention and acceptable aesthetics remains a challenge, however.
In order to overcome the shortcomings associated with conventional light redirecting products, Lucent Optics' Phase I SBIR project focused on developing a new light redirecting film material and associated innovative manufacturing technology that allows for inexpensively converting certain types of commodity films into daylighting products. Our light redirecting film employs embedded reflective microstructures that are several times thinner that a human hair, have near 100% reflectance and do not impede the light transmission through the film. This allows for achieving high daylight redirection efficiency while preserving the view or enhancing glare control. The proprietary manufacturing technology that imparts the light redirecting function to the raw material involves the formation of deep and narrow micro-channels and making these micro-channels channels highly reflective so that they can act as miniature light shelves embedded into the bulk of the material.
The research was guided by several technical objectives, including identifying suitable raw materials for the base layer of the film, identifying design tolerance limits to manufacturing errors, improving the precision and repeatability of the manufacturing technique, and developing and demonstrating functional samples of light redirecting film with high-fidelity embedded micro-channels. As a result of the project work, we have identified and adopted a commercially available glazing material with the chemical composition that is free from harmful phthalate-based plasticizers for making the core light-redirecting layer. We have also optimized the optical structure of the light redirecting film for this new material, significantly enhanced our manufacturing process compared to the baseline so it can now produce film samples that meet and exceed the established performance targets for commercial products, and fabricated and tested several functional prototypes of the light redirecting film using this improved process.
The final prototypes included "clear-view" and "diffuse" versions of the future product. The clear-view version redirects light while preserving the view through the window. The diffuse version has a textured surface with matte appearance and provides a wider angular dispersion of the redirected light and enhanced glare control.
The quality and repeatability of the manufacturing process was verified using 2D and 3D microscopy of sectional cuts of the produced samples. The light redirection efficiency, optical transmittance and overall daylighting performance of the samples were verified using dedicated optical tests and subscale models of a room in a commercial office building with South-facing windows. The developed process of making light redirecting materials could be used for creating a variety of advanced daylighting products in the form of window films, shades and window packets. It can also be broadly used in the lighting and photonics industries for making specialty optical diffusers and light control films.
Last Modified: 08/28/2019
Modified by: Sergiy Vasylyev
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