A simple experimental technique for the characterization of the performance of thermoelectric-coolers beyond 100°C

A novel experimental technique for the characterization of the performance of thermoelectric coolers (TECs) is presented. The test setup is simple and enables validation of TEC performance in a wide temperature range, especially, at the high temperatures required for modem high-temperature TECs. The proposed experimental setup was found to perform remarkably well in characterizing several TECs of two vendors. The TECs under the present study showed markedly different performance than predicted using the vendors recommended equations and thermophysical properties. It was demonstrated that the major cause for the observed deviations was related to a substantial difference between the thermophysical properties provided by the vendors and the actual effective properties of the assembled TECs. Especially the effective Seebeck coefficient measured in the present study was lower by almost 25% than for the pure material.