Green Antenna for Solar Energy Collection

For the first time, the idea of using a light-reflecting metallic antenna for design of a solar-cell system is proposed. The antenna for this new concept is named Green Antenna for its association with renewable energy. Both the Green Antenna and its ground plane simultaneously act as light-reflecting surfaces for the solar-cell system. To demonstrate the idea, a suspended plate antenna (SPA) array is built on a nonplanar ground plane that provides focusing effect for the light. Each SPA element is excited by an L-probe to give a wideband microwave operation. Since the nonplanar ground plane can provide light-focusing effect, larger output voltages can be obtained from the solar-cell systems. The increased voltage can be as much as ~80% higher than that without the Green Antenna. The reflection coefficients, input impedance, antenna gain, and radiation patterns of the Green Antenna are studied. The proposed configurations are potentially useful to wireless communication systems that require self-sustained power.