Solar Heating, Cooling and Power Generation—Current Profiles and Future Potentials

Abstract

Due to the large amount of consumption of the fossil fuels, the ecological environment has suffered serious pollution and damage. Solar power technologies provide the best solution to the current energy and environment issues. In past decades, global solar thermal capacity increased rapidly, and now it has been used worldwide to provide heating, cooling and power generation. However, after years of development, solar energy utilization technology still faces problems such as low efficiency, high cost, difficulty in energy storage and unstable energy supply, which have been seriously restricting its applications. This chapter briefly summarizes the concept and classification of solar heating, cooling and power generation. Furthermore, some technology development and potential applications relating to solar heating, cooling and power generation are discussed.