Abstract
Passive daytime radiative cooling (PDRC) technology has great potential in reducing cooling energy consumption. In order to further improve the spectral performance of PDRC coatings, current researchers mostly focus on the selection and size design of functional particles, while ignoring the optical properties enhancement effect caused by the interlayer binder. In this study, based on the principle that the refractive index difference between layers enhanced the backscattering performance of the solar spectrum, we proposed and manufactured a double-layer PDRC coating with polyvinylidene difluoride (PVDF) as the film-forming material in the upper layer and polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) as the film-forming material in the lower layer, both filled with Al2O3 and SiO2 particles. The double-layer PDRC coating exhibited excellent spectral performance that a high solar reflectivity of 98% and an emissivity of 0.95 at the “atmospheric window” band. In comparison, the solar spectrum reflectivity of the single-layer PDRC coatings based on PVDF and PDMS of the same thickness was 95% and 94.7%, respectively. Outdoor tests showed that the PDRC coating achieved a temperature decrease of up to 7.1°C under direct sunlight at noon time. In addition, the PDRC coating had excellent weather resistance, water resistance, and other basic properties. This article opens up a new idea and provides methodological guidance for the design of double-layer PDRC coatings.
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This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 52306078 and 52211530089), Taishan Scholars of Shandong Province (Grant No. tsqn201812105), the Natural Science Foundation of Shandong Province (Grant No. ZR2023QE141), and the Royal Society (Grant No. IECNSFC211210). A very special acknowledgment is made to the editors and anonymous peer reviewers who provided important comments that improved this paper.
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Wang, F., Li, C., Yang, Z. et al. A double-layer radiative cooling coating that utilizes the refractive index difference between layers to achieve extremely high solar reflectivity. Sci. China Technol. Sci. (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11431-023-2603-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11431-023-2603-2