Performance Evaluation of the Thermoelectric Generator

Abstract

The energy produced by the thermoelectric generators is clean and it can be used for the niches application. The paper presents the characterization of the commercial Bi 2 Te 3 thermoelectric generator in function of the temperature. The temperature difference between the two parts of the thermoelectric generator is increased using an additional thermoelectric device to heat the hot part, and an aluminum cooler for maintaining the cold part at quasi constant temperature. The I-V and the P-V characteristics of the thermoelectric element are measured at different temperatures. The maxim power, the Seebeck coefficient and the internal electric resistance are calculated. The software to control the devices, to perform the measurements and analyse the data is created.