Anybody Using Thermo Electric in their PV System?

Re: Anybody Using Thermo Electric in their PV System?

Neat stuff, and had a thought. There is no need to just consider air cooling. They use water to cool computer processors, so there's no reason why water can't be used to cool one of these TEC jobbies. If a TEC will produce power with a 50 degree differential, water can get you there.

All you'd need to do is build a heat sink that uses water instead of air fins, and pipe that water into a radiator on the outside of the house. You'd also have to use an antifreeze to keep the water from freezing on the outside. Build it so the radiator is higher than the TECs and you can use convection force to circulate the water. If it isn't enough, add a couple more TECs to power a low draw water pump. No need to have a strong pump since all you are doing is circulating the water, not pressurizing the system.

You'd also have the option of using freon (not necessarily R12, using freon as a generic term) to cool the plates like a heat tube, as used in this refrigerator example. They are able to draw enough heat PASSIVELY to keep a freezer cold inside the house in the winter, it'll surely draw enough heat to draw 50-75 degrees off a TEC without using any power at all.

EDIT - It also occurs to me that you could set up a hot water and a cold water loop as power generation. You could use solar water heating to heat a set amount of water, then use that hot water to generate electricity 24 hours a day. It looks like the solar shed I planned to build when I finally build a house would be perfect for adding some of these units on, you could heat enough water with solar tubes to heat your household water, provide heat for the house itself, and provide heat for the hot side of these generators, turning the hot water system into a tri-use system instead of a dual-use system, with no real loss of heat depending on the answer to my question below. It may not make tons of power as you guys say, but if it were to, say, make enough to counteract any ghosting loads from the TV set or enough to keep cell phones and laptops charged, might be worth looking into.

Hope these new thoughts help out on this, if it works for someone I'll be very interested.

I do have a question though, is there a measurable difference in using a TEC vs not using a TEC? I mean say you have 5 gallons of water in an insulated box and you raise the water temp to 150 degrees, then let it cool down on its own, and measure the time it takes to get to room temperature. Would there be a difference in how long it takes for 5 gallons to cool to room temp with a TEC vs without a TEC, if all else is equal? In other words, is the TEC actively drawing a lot of heat away, or is it just accepting what happens its way and making electricity out of it?