Development of Nano-materials: A Self-cleaning Coating and an Insulation Coating

Glazing materials have been widely used to replace conventional building envelopes for aesthetic appearance and daylight in modern buildings. BEEE researchers led by Prof. YANG Hongxing have developed a low-cost, environmentally friendly and highly transparent nano paste that can be coated on different kinds of surfaces, including solar panels and curtain walls, to protect them from organic and inorganic dirt under sunlight activation and rainwater brush. They have significantly reduced cleansing costs by 70% as well as increased the average output power of solar panels up to 11.7%. The highly transparent, robust and multifunctional coating also protects surfaces from corrosion by sandstorms and acid rain so that their life span can be greatly extended. Prof. LU Lin’s research group has developed transparent coating that can block 90% infrared radiation and 99% UV light with over 80% visible light transmittance, so it can reduce solar heat gain through local glazing windows and energy use by over 40%. These inventions have attracted many major international prizes and awards. Two patents from mainland China and USA have been granted. A licencing agreement with a local company to commercialize these technologies and several projects are applying the coating technology for energy savings.

Highly-dispersed self-cleaning coating on window glazing in PolyU

Comparison of solar photovoltaic panels with and without self-cleaning coating after two months