Design of thermal systems based on combination of Thermoelectric and Vapor Chamber technologies

Abstract

Relatively low efficiency of thermoelectric systems is a main limiting factor for extension of the Thermoelectric technology application fields. A prospective way of efficiency improvement based on combination of Thermoelectric and Vapor Chamber thermal technologies is shown and analyzed in the paper. Aluminum Vapor Chamber technology has been chosen for evaluations because of its important advantages: high thermal conductivity, light weight, wide working temperature range. A series of experiments and computer simulations has been performed to define effective thermal conductivity of Aluminum Vapor Chamber in conjunction with thermoelectric modules. It was found that Aluminum Vapor Chamber performs thermally like isotropic material with effective thermal conductivity of 8363 W/m/K. Performance of the thermoelectric air conditioners containing Vapor Chamber have been estimated. It was shown that use of combination of Thermoelectric and Vapor Chamber Technologies (TVC systems) provides significant improvement of cooling capacity at the same working conditions.