ICT2014 Abstracts

Thermoelectric power generation is a promising technology for a broad range of waste heat recovery applications. Despite the improved performances of thermoelectric materials in recent years, more effort is needed on effective design models in order to maximize system level performance and reliability of thermoelectric generators. Herein, a comprehensive model including heat exchanger and thermoelectric module has been built and solved using finite volume and finite element method respectively (commercial software Ansys was used as the modeling platform in this work). With this model, we were able to predict the thermal efficiency and pressure drop of the heat exchanger, thermal to electric conversion efficiency of the thermoelectric module, and thermal stresses under device operation. We demonstrated our model for automotive waste heat recovery with thermoelectric power generation modules. Given the exhaust temperature and mass flow rate, the electric power output predicted by our model is in good agreement with the experimental results shown in literatures. Using our model, both the heat exchanger design and the thermoelectric module have been optimized in order to obtain the maximum electric power output, minimum pressure drop and minimum thermal stresses. In addition, our model can be used to predict thermoelectric material consumptions per electric power output, and optimize the cost and payback period of thermoelectric power generation. The model developed in this work provides effective guidelines to design thermoelectric generation systems for automotive waste heat recovery applications.