Experimental research of solar thermoelectric generator based on flat heat pipe

Abstract

Solar thermoelectric generator based on Seebeck effect can convert solar radiation into electric energy, but the solar radiation intensity is low, the conversion efficiency is low. Using the heat pipe can improve the hot side temperature of the TEG, so as to improve the thermoelectric performance. A flat plate heat pipe assisted thermoelectric generator is constructed (FTEG) in this paper, and experimentally studies the effects of heating power and heat pipe length on the FTEG performance. The results show that with the increase of heating power, the output power and power generation efficiency of the system increase gradually, and with the increase of heat pipe length, the thermoelectric performance decreases. In addition, when the length is less than 500 mm, the performance of the FTEG changes little. In this paper, the results have guiding significance about the design and optimization of solar thermoelectric generator.