Test Method for Heat to Electricity Conversion Efficiency of Thermoelectric Unicouple

Author

Zhang, Lili ; Zhang, Jianzhong ; Ren, Baoguo ; Wang, Zeshen

Author_Institution

Tianjin Inst. of Power Sources

fYear

2006

fDate

6-10 Aug. 2006

Firstpage

390

Lastpage

393

Abstract

The heat to electricity conversion efficiency is the basic parameter of thermoelectric element, thermoelectric unicouple and thermoelectric devices. The authors present a new test method for heat to electricity conversion efficiency of thermoelectric unicouple. The input heat of thermoelectric unicouple has been divided into two parts including the output electric power and output heat out of the unicouple cold side. The later has been determined by a thermoelectric heat meter. The thermoelectric heat meter has a high sensitivity, so that high test accuracy could be gained on the determination of heat out of the unicouple cold side. The paper presents test results for heat to electricity conversion efficiency of some thermoelectric unicouple, and discusses about the factors which affect the test results, especially about the calibration of the heat meter

Keywords

thermocouples; thermoelectric conversion; heat-to-electricity conversion efficiency; thermoelectric unicouple; Electric variables measurement; Energy conversion; Materials testing; Power generation; Power measurement; Resistance heating; Temperature; Thermal conductivity; Thermoelectric devices; Thermoelectricity;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Thermoelectrics, 2006. ICT '06. 25th International Conference on

Conference_Location

Vienna

ISSN

1094-2734

Print_ISBN

1-4244-0811-3

Electronic_ISBN

1094-2734

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/ICT.2006.331279

Filename

4133312