Volume 14: Low Carbon Cities and Urban Energy Systems: Part III

A combination of thermoelectric generator and organic Rankine cycle for both waste heat recovery and engine oil warm-up in a passenger car Song Lan, Shukun Wang, Richard Stobart, Xiaonan Wang

Abstract

Thermoelectric generator (TEG) and organic Rankine cycle (ORC) are both promising waste heat recovery technologies, which have different advantages and disadvantages in operating temperature, size and efficiency. A combination of TEG and ORC systems forming a TEG-ORC system has the possibility to complement each other achieving a win-win situation. The paper proposes a combined TEG-ORC system applied in passenger cars for both waste heat recovery and engine warm-up. This bifunctional TEG-ORC system has a novel layout utilizing components that already exist in a passenger car to reduce the size of system. To evaluate the performance of TEG-ORC, a semi-empirical model is developed. The fuel saving potential of the vehicular TEG-ORC system along the world light vehicle test procedure (WLTP) is estimated. The results indicate that 0.13% and 3.19 % of fuel saving potential are respectively achieved in the fast engine warm-up and waste heat recovery compared to the baseline vehicle without the TEG-ORC system.

Keywords thermoelectric generator, organic Rankine cycle, engine warm-up, waste heat recovery, passenger car