Automotive exhaust thermoelectric generators: Current status, challenges and future prospects

Shen, Zu-Guo; Tian, Linli; Liu, Xun

doi:10.1016/j.enconman.2019.05.087

Cited by 205 publications

(68 citation statements)

References 126 publications

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“…It is important to compare these results against the state-of-the-art results from literature. Shen et al [43] provide a useful revision. The most performant automotive TEGs reported achieve around 1 kW, but they are applied to heavy duty vehicles [44]- [46].…”

Section: Electrical Output and Efficiencymentioning

confidence: 99%

Compact automotive thermoelectric generator with embedded heat pipes for thermal control

Pacheco

Brito

Vieira

et al. 2020

Energy

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Currently, the automotive industry faces challenges to implement solutions that provide reductions in energy consumption, pollutants and greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions. Exhaust heat recovery employing Thermoelectric generators (TEGs) enables the direct conversion of heat into electric energy without moving parts and little to no maintenance. On-board electrical production is especially useful given the growing electrification trend of road vehicles. The present work assesses the performance of a novel temperature-controlled thermoelectric generator (TCTG) concept in a light duty vehicle and its impact on fuel economy and GHG emissions under realistic driving conditions. The novel exhaust heat exchanger (HE) concept consists of corrugated pipes embedded in a cast aluminium matrix along with variable conductance heat pipes (VCHPs) acting as spreaders of excess heat along the longitudinal direction. This concept seems to have a quite good potential for highly variable thermal load applications, as it is able to avoid overheating by spreading heat instead of wasting it through bypass systems. Furthermore, when compared to previous concepts by the group, it does not need gravity assistance and has a form factor similar to conventional generators. It also appears to be capable of delivering a breakthrough electric output for TEG systems in such light vehicles, with as much as 572 W and 1538 W of average and maximum electric powers during a driving cycle, respectively, and showing a quite promising reduction of 5.4% in fuel consumption and CO2 emissions.

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Section: Electrical Output and Efficiencymentioning

confidence: 99%

Compact automotive thermoelectric generator with embedded heat pipes for thermal control

Pacheco

Brito

Vieira

et al. 2020

Energy

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“…In fact, the most abundant source of waste heat energy in ICEs is the one contained in the exhaust gases, whose temperature can sometimes surpass 700ºC. That energy amount is of the same order of magnitude as the mechanical energy provided to the driveshaft [2,3]. Additionally, due to its high temperature, it displays a good recovery potential from a second law of thermodynamics standpoint [8,9,13,14].…”

Section: Waste Heat Recovery Systemsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Another attractive solution to harvest the energy released by exhaust gases consists on transforming it directly into electrical power avoiding moving parts and the corresponding maintenance costs. This is possible when using thermoelectric generators (TEGs), which produce electricity when there is a temperature difference across the module faces because of the Seebeck effect [2,3,17,18]. The exhaust gases heat the hot face and a cooling circuit keeps the opposite face (cold face) at as low a temperature as possible.…”

Section: Waste Heat Recovery Systemsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Efficiencies of commercially available TEG modules are around 5% for the automotive temperature range [15], typically lower than those of ORC systems, although a lot of work has been developed recently in nanostructured materials and the exploring phenomena such as quantum confinement, which may increase the efficiency to values closer to ORC [2,17]. Due to their simplicity, lack of maintenance and scalability, several vehicle manufacturers have been exploring the potential of these systems for achieving fuel efficiency improvements above 10% [3,[19][20][21][22].…”

Section: Waste Heat Recovery Systemsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The quest for reducing energy consumption, pollutants and greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions is one of the main factors affecting the automotive industry research nowadays [1][2][3]. In terms of fuel consumption, the 2020 European Union target equates to approximately 4.1 L/100 km of petrol or 3.6 L/100 km of diesel.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Efficiency improvement of vehicles using temperature controlled exhaust thermoelectric generators

Brito

Pacheco

Vieira

et al. 2020

Energy Conversion and Management

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One of the main obstacles for the use of thermoelectric generators (TEGs) in vehicles is the highly variable thermal loads typical of driving cycles. Under these conditions it will be virtually impossible for a conventional heat exchanger to avoid both thermal dilution under low thermal loads and TEG overheating under high thermal loads. The authors have been exploring an original heat exchanger concept able to address the aforementioned problems. It uses a variable conductance thermosiphon-based phase-change buffer between the heat source and the TEGs so that a nearly constant, optimized temperature is obtained regardless of operating conditions. To the best of the authors' knowledge, the thermal control feature of the system is unique among existing TEG concepts. The novelty of the present work is the actual computation of operating pressure and temperature and the corresponding vaporization and condensation rates inside the thermosiphon system during driving cycles along with the assessment of the influence of the volumes and pre-charge pressure on electrical output. The global energy and emission savings were also computed for a typical yearly driving profile. It was observed that indeed the concept has unparalleled potential for improving the efficiency of vehicles using TEGs, with around 6% fuel and CO2 emissions savings using the system. This seems a breakthrough for such light duty applications since the efficiency of conventional (passive) systems is strongly deprecated by thermal dilution under low thermal loads and the need to bypass high thermal load events to avoid overheating. On the contrary, the present concept allows the control of the hot face temperature of the TEGs even under highly variable thermal load (i.e. driving cycle) environments.

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High‐Performance Phosphor‐in‐Glass Film on Thermoelectric Generator for Non‐Radiative Energy Recycling in Laser Lighting

Peng

Zhao

et al. 2023

Adv Materials Technologies

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Huge heat energy is ultimately generated in the color converter as a result of the nonradiative recombination of high‐power laser excitation. Inspired by the thermoelectric conversion, a high‐performance phosphor‐in‐glass film (PIGF) coated on a thermoelectric generator (TEG) for nonradiative energy recycling in high‐brightness laser lighting is proposed. The heat‐resistance PIGF with high luminescence is tightly coated on the hot‐side ceramic of TEG, while yielding a bright white light and promoting the heat conduction between PIGF and TEG. At the PIGF thickness of 60 µm, the PIGF‐TEG enables a natural white light with a luminous flux of 464 lm, a luminous efficacy of 194 lm W−1, a correlated color temperature (CCT) of 6552 K, and an appropriate chromaticity coordinate of (0.3117, 0.3302) under a laser power of 2.39 W. Aside from the high‐brightness output white light with a luminous flux of 1045 lm, the laser‐driven PIGF‐TEG produces the output voltage and current of 0.46 V and 174 mA under a laser power of 5.61 W, respectively. Therefore, the proposed PIGF‐TEG provides a potential strategy for heat energy recycling in high‐power phosphor‐converted lighting.

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Automotive exhaust thermoelectric generators: Current status, challenges and future prospects

Cited by 205 publications

References 126 publications

Compact automotive thermoelectric generator with embedded heat pipes for thermal control

Compact automotive thermoelectric generator with embedded heat pipes for thermal control

Efficiency improvement of vehicles using temperature controlled exhaust thermoelectric generators

High‐Performance Phosphor‐in‐Glass Film on Thermoelectric Generator for Non‐Radiative Energy Recycling in Laser Lighting

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