Experimental study on a novel split thermoelectric cooler of big temperature difference for combined cooling and heating supply

Abstract

The improvement in maximum temperature difference is very important for thermoelectric cooler potential applications under severe and complex conditions. Currently, the maximum temperature difference of commercial single-stage thermoelectric modules represented is usually below 70 K and the energy efficiency is not high. In this paper, 12 kinds of split thermoelectric modules are developed according to different semiconductor and connector structures, and their performance is compared by experiments. The results show that the temperature difference of novel split thermoelectric cooler can exceed 200 K, which is more than 180 % higher than the currently commercial module (70 K), and it also has good performance under high ambient temperature. The new thermoelectric module can achieve the application of cold and hot ends energy on long-distance different occasions and has a module coefficient of performances of 2.68 and 1.29 under temperature differences of 57.43 K and 197.73 K, respectively. Meanwhile, a new asymmetric design method for independent control of hot and cold end temperatures is presented. It can achieve independent heat flux density design for cold and hot ends, and its performance can be further enhanced by regulating the temperature of connector.