Seminar on Multifunctional PV-X Technologies: Solar Beyond Electricity

14 Sep 2026 10.30 AM - 11.30 AM LT7 (North Spine, NS1-02-03) Current Students, Public

Professor Christos N. Markides

Imperial College London, U.K.

This seminar will be chaired by A/P Fei Duan.

Seminar Abstract

Photovoltaic (PV) panels are typically less than 20% efficient in delivering electricity from the Sun’s energy. The efficiency losses are especially pronounced when PV panels are exposed to high irradiance conditions on warm, sunny days, which lead to higher temperature operation. Of the total amount of sunlight incident on PV panels, over 70% is lost to the environment as waste heat. This loss has motivated the development of ‘hybrid’ PV-thermal (PV-T) collectors, which combine PV cells with a contacting fluid. The fluid recovers waste heat from the cells, thus delivering a potentially useful thermal output, while simultaneously cooling the cells and increasing their electrical efficiency. Recently, a new concept that we refer to as multifunctional ‘PV-X’ collector technology has emerged, in which secondary processes are integrated synergistically with the PV cells, exploiting the available waste heat to perform additional functions directly within the collector. In this talk, we will present conventional and advanced PV-T and PV-X collector concepts and designs, along with their underlying operational principles. We will explore opportunities for further developing these technologies and examine how new materials can drive improvements from the component to the system level, while discussing the potential of integrating these technologies into broader solar-energy systems capable of providing cooling, heating, power, fuels or clean water.

Speaker's Biography 
Christos Markides is Professor of Clean Energy Technologies and Head of the Clean Energy Processes Laboratory at Imperial College London. He is also, amongst other, Editor-in-Chief of journal Applied Thermal Engineering and founding Editor-in-Chief of new journal AI Thermal Fluids. He specialises in applied thermodynamics, fluid flow and heat/mass transfer processes in high performance devices, technologies and systems for energy recovery, conversion or storage, with a particular interest in the recovery and utilisation of solar, renewable and waste heat. He has authored >460 articles on these topics, that have attracted >23,000 citations (h-index = 79) to date; highlights include a recent review of hybrid solar technologies related to this talk: ‘A review of solar hybrid photovoltaic-thermal (PV-T) collectors and systems’ (Progress in Energy and Combustion Science, 2023), and an article proposing a device referred to as a “PV leaf” for simultaneous clean water provision and power generation with efficiencies that exceed standalone PV: ‘High-efficiency bio inspired hybrid multi-generation photovoltaic leaf’ (Nature Communications, 2023). He has won multiple awards, most recently IChemE’s Global ‘Clean Energy Medal’ in 2025, and received Imperial College President’s Awards for Research Excellence in 2018. He is the also founding Director and CEO of Imperial spin-out company Solar Flow.

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