Fabrication of Nanostructured Skutterudite-Based Thermoelectric Module and Design of a Maximum Power Point Tracking System for the Thermoelectric Pile

Abstract

In a bid to realize the applications of skutterudite-based thermoelectric modules and maximally utilize the output power of its thermoelectric pile, first, nanocomposite n-type skutterudite-based material was prepared by adding the nano phase AgSbTe2, giving rise to a dimensionless figure-of-merit of 0.91. Then, skutterudite-based modules were fabricated and tested, which showed high area-ratio power of nearly 0.244W · cm−2. At last, in order to obtain the maximum output power for the skutterudite-based thermoelectric pile and improve the energy efficiency, a power management system based on maximum power point tracking (MPPT) technology was designed and tested. The perturbation observation method was adopted for the MPPT. Test results showed that the maximum efficiency of the system was over 98%. Meantime, when the open-circuit voltage of the thermoelectric pile was over 21.2 V, the system operating efficiency was larger than 90%.