Triband Glazing for Simultaneous Year-Round Energy Savings and Anticondensations

Windows remain the most vulnerable components in buildings and vehicles due to their susceptibility to both energy loss and surface condensation. Photonic engineering has been applied separately for passive thermal management and anticondensation applications. However, current research lacks a codesign approach to achieve simultaneous year-round energy savings combined with anticondensation performance. Herein, we propose a triband photonic design that regulates energy exchange between glazing surfaces and multiple thermodynamic sources: solar radiation, outer space, building envelopes, and atmospheric conditions. This design achieves a haze value below 1.1%, 71.6% visible light transmittance, 58.9% near-infrared absorption, and 0.06 mid-infrared emissivity. The near-infrared absorption not only blocks solar heat gain but also elevates glazing surface temperature to enhance anticondensation performance. Low mid-infrared emission reduces radiative heat exchange between windows and internal or external environments, thus saving energy for both cooling and heating. Furthermore, low mid-infrared emission suppresses the radiative cooling effect at night. Consequently, the triband glass is 1.43 °C warmer than commercial glass at night, resulting in a 4-fold reduction in moisture condensation rates. Simulations, by the EnergyPlus building energy consumption software, indicate a 19.1% reduction in annual energy consumption and a 62.4% decrease in monthly winter rooftop surface condensation time for the Water Cube in Beijing, China, amounting to 145.5 MJ m–2 and 274 h, respectively. This triband glazing provides superior energy savings and anticondensation capabilities compared to commercial glass across most climate zones, thereby supporting global carbon neutrality and sustainability when integrated with existing windows.