Back to results
US 10,665,730 B2Granted
Photovoltaic fabric with woven bus architecture
AssigneePepin Technologies LLC.
InventorKarl A. Pepin
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A fabric comprising a plurality of photovoltaic filaments includes a conductive bus structure woven into the selvage edge of the fabric, providing a robust and flexible electrical connection from the positive and negative electrode leads of the photovoltaic filaments. The bus structure may be formed in segments which can include any combination of series and parallel configurations to accommodate loads requiring specified voltage and current.
Claims10
A woven photovoltaic fabric comprising a photovoltaic active area, opposed first and second edges on opposite sides of the photovoltaic active area, and further comprising:
- a plurality of non-photovoltaic warp filaments;
- a plurality of discrete-length photovoltaic weft elements, wherein each said photovoltaic weft element has a clad portion in which a positive electrode and a negative electrode are surrounded by a cladding, a terminated positive electrode extending from a first end of the clad portion free of the cladding into the first edge of the fabric, and a terminated negative electrode extending free of the cladding from a second end of said clad portion opposite said terminated positive electrode into the second edge of the fabric, wherein the cladding, the terminated negative electrode, and the terminated positive electrode are not concentric;
- a first and second plurality of conductive elements woven into the first and second edges of the photovoltaic fabric, making electrical termination with said terminated positive electrodes and terminated negative electrodes in respective first and second bus structures on opposite edges of the photovoltaic fabric.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.