Performance modelling on a thermoelectric air conditioning system using high power heat sinks and promoting waste heat utilization

The paper presents a performance modelling on a thermoelectric air conditioning system. This system uses high power heat sinks designed by an established model to effectively remove waste heat produced by thermoelectric modules, which significantly increase COPs. The system can be smartly integrated into buildings and provides heating, cooling and heat recovery ventilation, the waste heat produced by the system can be used for domestic drying services. Experimentally validated computer model was used for the performance analysis of the system for various operating conditions. Modelling results showed that the system using high power heat sinks can achieve 103% and 682% higher cooling COP compared to that using conventional medium and low power heat sinks. It was also found that use of an air mixture which contains 1/4 part of the room ventilation air and 3/4 part of outdoor air as a cooling medium and heat source can achieve 10% and 22% of higher cooling COP and 10%–15% higher heating COP respectively. In cooling mode, owing to the waste heat utilization, the overall COP of the system is much higher. In addition, the system using microencapsulated PCM instead of a heat sink is also investigated.