Optimization of Electrical Energy Harvesting from Focused Infrared light using Thermoelectric module with Uniform Heat Distribution

Abstract

Thermoelectric (TE) module is a harvester which converts heat energy into electrical energy. Heat energy dissipation is everywhere from electronic appliances to mechanical engines and machines, and considered is a wasted energy. However, TE module can be used to recover the heat energy and converted into useful electrical energy. In this paper, infrared (IR) light is being used as the heat source mimicking the sunlight optimum spectrum of heat production and applied on TE module to generate electrical energy. In order to maximize the heat generation from IR light, a convex lens was used to focus the light beam onto the hot-side surface of TE module. The temperature of IR light and focused IR light was plotted in the graph and compared. This followed by three experiment set-ups to investigate the optimum arrangement of TE module which is TE module without heat distributor on its hot-side surface and TE module with heat distribution. The heat distributor can distribute uniformly the heat from the focused IR light on the hot-side surface of the metal and propagate to the TE module underneath. An electrical output power of 10W was measured for TE module with a metal block as heat distributor compared to 2W for TE module without proper heat distribution.