Abstract
This study presents the characterisation of a prototype thermoelectric generator including ceramic
Introduction
The development and application of thermoelectric materials, for example, for harvesting electrical power from waste heat sources, is a current field of study that requires interdisciplinary investigations. The implementation of newly developed thermoelectric materials into thermoelectric generators (TEGs) benefits from modeling the thermoelectric properties of the generators with respect to the individual properties of the employed materials. A TEG is a device that transfers energy from thermal (entropy) current to electric current; see Fuchs (2010, 2014) and Feldhoff (2015). The concept of energy carriers as outlined by Falk, Herrmann, and Schmid (1983) enables an elegant description of a thermoelectric device, which relies on considering the flux densities of the aforementioned fluid-like quantities entropy
The thermoelectric tensor consists of three tensorial quantities, the specific electrical conductivity
The basic unit of a thermoelectric generator can be constructed by connecting two materials with different algebraic signs for the Seebeck coefficient
Among the various thermoelectric materials, semiconductors exhibit the best thermoelectric conversion efficiency because of their moderate charge carrier concentration, and they provide a good balance between specific electric conductivity
Additionally, the geometric properties of the materials that are combined to form the complete device have to be optimized for every system. Finite-element method (FEM) simulations are useful for calculating the thermoelectric performance in terms of the used materials and their geometric properties without constructing a real TEG. The thermoelectric properties can be measured for each individual material. Afterwards, the materials can be combined in a simulated TEG system with a specific geometry. The absolute currents
Under electric open-circuit conditions, eq. (1) yields the entropy current
The specific entropy conductivity
Under isothermal conditions, eq. (1) yields the electric current
Experimental
Thermoelectric Measurement Setup
To characterize the thermoelectric properties of the materials, the temperature-dependent isothermal specific electric resistivity and the Seebeck coefficient, as estimated from the thermovoltage, were measured. A precision vertical diamond wire-saw model 3242 from O’WELL was used for sample preparation. Thermoelectric properties were measured using a measurement cell constructed in-house. The sample was clamped between two platinum electrodes to close the electric circuit in a pseudo-four-point measurement. The applied furnace was an ELITE thermal system. The Seebeck coefficient was measured using a NORECS Probostat measurement system. The electronic parameters were measured with KEITHLEY 2100 6
To estimate the thermoelectric characteristics of the constructed TEG, it was placed between a heat source (ceramic hot-plate) and a heat sink (passive cooler). A photomicrograph of the measurement setup is shown in Figure 1.

Photomicrograph of the measurement setup for determination of the thermoelectric characteristics of the constructed TEG. Note that the p-type ceramic material is integrated as rectangular bars while the n-type wire material exhibits the form of a cylinder.
The temperature data were collected using thermocouples. The voltage
The resistivity of the thermoelectric generator was estimated by analysing the electric current-voltage characteristics using Ohm’s law for the entire device (see eq. (6) for the corresponding relation for single materials).
The geometric parameters of applied materials, that are input parameters for the FEM tool, are listed in Table 1.
Measured geometric properties of the TEG’s components: length
Component | Material | L/mm | A/ | Description |
---|---|---|---|---|
p-type leg | 10.0 | 3.23 | House-made ceramic | |
n-type leg | 10.0 | 0.79 | Commercial alloy | |
el. connector | Ag-epoxy resin | 0.44 | 5.32 | Commercial composite |
Cover plates | 3.8 | 225 | Commercial ceramic |
Microstructure Analysis
The phase composition of the metallic n-type and ceramic p-type materials was analyzed by X-ray diffraction (XRD) using a Bruker D8 Advance with Cu-
Materials Choice
The p-type leg material was realized by applying ceramic
The series connection of n- and p-type legs of the generator was realized using Ag-epoxy resin as electrical conductive glue. The bulk resistivity was reported with a value of
For the cover plates, commonly used
Finite-element Simulations
In this work, a prototype thermoelectric generator was constructed and rebuild in the FEM tool using ANSYS Mechanical APDL version 15.0 academic. The specific resistivity of the Ag-epoxy resin was adapted in the simulation to match the measured transport properties and to obtain the correct electric currents in the modeled device. The model consists of 14,268 elements. Each thermoelectric p-type leg is build up by 48 elements (total number of p-type material elements for the thermoelectric legs is 192) while the total number of elements for the electrical Ag-epoxy connectors is 2964. Each alumina cover plate consists of 1482 elements. The simulation procedure was performed using the 3-D steady-state thermoelectric analyser. The residual method was done using the thermal power
The non-linear solution converged after 5 equilibrium iterations. The constructed and modeled device is presented in Figure 2.

View on the constructed and modeled thermoelectric device. (a) Side-view of constructed TEG, (b) Side-view of modeled device, (c) Perspective view of modeled device, (d) Top-view on modeled device.
Results and Discussion
Microstructure of Materials
The crystallographic phases of the sintered p-type

Measured X-ray diffractograms (blue curves) with Rietveld fits (red curves) and differential curve (grey curves). (a) p-type
The p-type

Secondary electron micrograph of the vibration-polished p-type
Thermoelectric Investigations
Table 2 lists measured or reported values for the transport properties of each material that was applied in the generator. The electronic and thermal quantities for the
Determined or reported thermoelectrical parameters of applied materials. Simulation A assumes vanishing contact resistances and Simulation B accounts for non-vanishing contact resistances by considering them by varying the effective resistance
Material | |||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|
363 | 59.21 | 147.39 | 0.62 | ||
403 | 49.93 | 154.95 | 0.59 | ||
443 | 36.58 | 162.53 | 0.57 | ||
478 | 32.66 | 169.12 | 0.57 | ||
300–500 | -40 | 23 | |||
300 | n.a. | 30 | |||
Ag-epoxy resin | 300 | 0.9 | n.a. | 1 | |
(Simulation A) | |||||
Ag-epoxy resin | 363 | n.a. | 1 | ||
(Simulation B) | 403 | n.a. | 1 | ||
443 | n.a. | 1 | |||
478 | n.a. | 1 |
To estimate the thermoelectric properties of the TEG, the device was characterized in the setup shown in Figure 1. The temperature-dependent resistivity of the entire device
Estimated thermoelectric parameters of the constructed TEG for different temperature conditions.
389 | 60 | 363 | 415.24 | 0.93 | 39.4 | 0.09 | 22.66 |
441 | 80 | 403 | 250.36 | 2.90 | 53.9 | 0.22 | 19.12 |
492 | 100 | 443 | 74.50 | 16.54 | 70.2 | 0.94 | 3.89 |
536 | 120 | 478 | 63.93 | 32.52 | 91.2 | 1.43 | 3.33 |
The FEM simulation resulted in accurate values for the open-circuit voltage
Figure 5(a) shows

Measured (dots) and simulated (lines) results for the thermoelectric characteristics of the constructed TEG. (a) Electric voltage-current
Thermoelectric parameters of the modeled TEG for Simulation A and Simulation B.
Simulation A | Simulation B | |||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
389 | 60 | 363 | 7.33 | 37.01 | 40.4 | 5.32 | 355.85 | 1.15 | 40.5 | 0.11 |
441 | 80 | 403 | 6.11 | 123.31 | 53.9 | 8.82 | 231.66 | 3.43 | 56.4 | 0.24 |
492 | 100 | 443 | 4.53 | 280.01 | 73.3 | 15.3 | 74.31 | 18.17 | 73.5 | 0.98 |
536 | 120 | 478 | 4.04 | 467.13 | 91.0 | 21.1 | 62.89 | 33.12 | 91.3 | 1.45 |
For absolutely correct solutions of FEM simulations in the framework of thermoelecric generator performance, both, the electric and the thermal contact resistances have to be considered, see Högblom and Andersson (2014). Implementation of contact resistances (electrical and thermal) into FEM simulations is not straight forward (see Annapragada et al. (2012)).
The simulation results are presented as contour-plots for the potential distributions and as vectorial plots that refer to the density of electric current

Simulated results for the thermoelectric characteristics of the constructed TEG. (a) Temperature distribution for
The flux density of electric charge
Summary and Conclusions
The model thermoelectric system created from the finite-element simulation provides results with acceptable accuracy in terms of the values for the open-circuit voltages. The simulation for the current densities and therefore for the electric power output of the generator was predicted with too high values. The overestimation of the electric current density is based on the formation of contact resistivities that were formed at the material boundaries of the Ag-epoxy resin as electric connector and the thermoelectrically active materials. Those contacts in TEG devices can be realized by different materials. The Ag-epoxy resin exhibits good properties in terms of processibility and mechanical fixation. The adhesive is more heat proved than Sn-Pb based solders. However, the contact resistances in thermoelectric generators are an important concern. Using the finite-element simulation tool, the quantitative electrical contact resistances could be determined.
After including the contact resistances into the electric resistivities of the connector material a good match of measured and simulated data were obtained. The Ag-epoxy resin was used as an alternative to soldering that can also exhibit high contact resistivities when ceramic materials are applied. The used thermoelectric materials are p-type
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© 2017 Walter de Gruyter Inc., Boston/Berlin
Artikel in diesem Heft
- Frontmatter
- Characterization of Real-world Vibration Sources and Application to Nonlinear Vibration Energy Harvesters
- Experimental Characterisation and Finite-element Simulations of a Thermoelectric Generator with Ceramic p-type Ca3Co4O9 and Metallic n-type Cu0.57Ni0.42Mn0.01 Legs
- Development of Compliant Thermoelectric Generators (TEGs) in Aerospace Applications Using Topology Optimization
Artikel in diesem Heft
- Frontmatter
- Characterization of Real-world Vibration Sources and Application to Nonlinear Vibration Energy Harvesters
- Experimental Characterisation and Finite-element Simulations of a Thermoelectric Generator with Ceramic p-type Ca3Co4O9 and Metallic n-type Cu0.57Ni0.42Mn0.01 Legs
- Development of Compliant Thermoelectric Generators (TEGs) in Aerospace Applications Using Topology Optimization