Seeking high energy conversion efficiency in a fully temperature-dependent thermoelectric medium

Kun Song, Deshun Yin, Haopeng Song, Peter Schiavone, Xun Wu and Lili Yuan

Energy, 2022, vol. 239, issue PE

Abstract: The material parameters associated with a thermoelectric medium show strong temperature dependence when the medium is subjected to a wide range of temperatures. This motivates the need to investigate the thermal-electric conversion efficiency of a temperature-dependent medium. In this paper, we develop the temperature field and electric potential associated with a one-dimensional thermoelectric medium with particular attention paid to the influence of various material parameters on the thermal-electric conversion efficiency. We use both theoretical and numerical methods and illustrate our results using several detailed numerical examples. Our numerical results show that the Thomson heat induced by a variable Seebeck coefficient is responsible for more than 20% of total energy leading to a 13% effect on the thermal-electric conversion efficiency. This remarkable result indicates that the thermal-electric conversion efficiency can be effectively optimized by controlling the heat exchange between the thermoelectric medium and its surroundings. In addition, our results indicate that when dealing with a large temperature range, the maximum thermal-electric conversion efficiency should not be taken as a function solely of an average thermoelectric figure of merit since it can vary considerably with different material parameters.

Keywords: Thermoelectric material; Thomson effect; Thermal-electric conversion efficiency; Temperature-dependence (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:energy:v:239:y:2022:i:pe:s036054422102689x

DOI: 10.1016/j.energy.2021.122440

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