Thermoelectric energy harvesting for fuel economy improvement and sustainable development

<p>Tae Young Kim</p>

Thermoelectric energy harvesting for fuel economy improvement and sustainable development

Tae Young Kim

Korea University of Science and Technology, South Korea

: J Nucl Ene Sci Power Generat Technol

Abstract

Waste heat recovery using thermoelectric energy conversion has garnered an increasing attention as a strong candidate for leading sustainable development and alleviating global warming and environmental problems. Despite importance on industrial fields and human life, the extent of most thermoelectric generation (TEG) research has been fallen into material science and module-level characteristics. In this study, we address energy harvesting performance of TEG from the system-level performance point of view to evaluate its potential on energy saving and fuel economy improvement. For optimal waste heat recovery, a thermal optimization method that includes design of internally finned exhaust gas channel was introduced to induce a proper level of temperature difference across thermoelectric modules while maintaining the pressure drop across the TEG below 3 kPa. The waste heat recovery performance of the TEG fabricated based on thermal optimization analysis was examined on a diesel engine while changing its operating conditions. The output power and conversion efficiency of the TEG are presented as a function of engine load and rotation speed. The maximum output power and conversion efficiency are ~119W and ~2.8%, respectively, using customized thermoelectric modules.