Novel Optimum Modeling, Design and Analysis of Thermoelectric Energy Harvesting for Automobile and Space Applications

Energy security is a vital question for the future of the world. Recovery of waste energy, together with the development of renewable and environmentally friendly energy sources, is no less of an important issue. It is estimated that 60% of the energy produced in most of today’s energy processes is nowadays waste, particularly in the form of heat. A viable way to restore waste energy is to use thermoelectric generators that turn heat into electricity. But to be widely applied, the efficiency of thermal-to-electricity transducers needs to be upgraded. Environment-friendly, noiseless power generation, completely reliable, and long-lasting energy sources, thermoelectric generator (TEG) is going to have a significant role in the upcoming energy technologies. As the demand for electric energy is rising day by day and TEG could be a source to mitigate energy demand in some sort. Though the main hindrance to the development of TEG is its efficiency with continuous research, its efficiency is increasing gradually. In this research paper, there has been modeled TEG through MATLAB/Simulink and with the addition of some Maximum Power Point Tracking (MPPT) method, e.g., Perturb and Observe (P&O), Incremental Conductance (IncCond) and Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO). Finally, in each case, their performance in terms of output voltage, current, power, and efficiency has been analyzed. An outstanding increment of efficiency has been observed, which can pave the way for new TEG technologies in a myriad of applications, such as an auxiliary energy source integrated with other main energy generation sources