New device architecture of a thermoelectric energy conversion for recovering low-quality heat

摘要: Low-quality heat is generally discarded for economic reasons; a low-cost energy conversion device considering price per watt, $/W, required to recover this waste heat. Thin-film based thermoelectric devices could be superior alternative purpose, on their low material consumption; however, power generated in conventional architecture negligible due the small temperature drop across thin film. To overcome challenge, we propose new architecture, and demonstrate approximately 60 Kelvin differences using thick polymer nanocomposite. The were achieved by separating thermal path from electrical path; whereas both charges share same path. We also applied harvest body confirmed its usability as an recovering low-quality