Highly effective photon-to-cooling thermal device

Photon-to-cooling phenomenon relies on the atmospheric transparency window to dissipate heat from the earth into outer space, which is an energy-saving cooling technique. This work demonstrates a highly effective aluminized Polymethylpentene (PMP) thin-film thermal structure. The emissivity of aluminized PMP thin films matches well to the atmospheric transparency window so as to minimize parasitic heat losses. This photon-to-cooling structure yields a temperature drop of 8.5 K in comparison to the ambient temperature and a corresponding radiative cooling power of 193 W/m2 during a one-day cycle. The easy-to-manufacture feature of an aluminized PMP thin film makes it a practically scalable radiative cooling method.