Cs-Ba ultrahigh-temperature solar TEC commutation element optimization

Theoretically studied is a problem involving the optimization of high‐temperature thermionic energy converters (TEC) taking into account electrical and thermal losses in a metal jumper connecting at series TEC commutation the emitter of one diode with the collector of the other. It is shown that for emitter temperature of 2600 K at optimal selection of jumper dimensions the difference between an ideal conversion efficiency and actual converter efficiency amounts to about 4%.