Thremoelectrics

I was just thinking about battery life and system cooling, and wondered if there is anything, even in development, that would utilize thermoelectrics to extend battery life and help with cooling. Given how much heat a laptop throws off, and how much power it uses, it seems like a good idea, especially for larger laptops where weight and size matter less. Obviously, you couldn't recover all the energy (thanks to physics), but even 10% or 20% increase in battery life... anyway, any one ever heard or seen anything of this sort? A theromoelectric computer power recovery system?

 

I've never heard of it being used in computers yet but I believe they are starting to at least talk about it. Formula 1 cars will be moving to a thermoelectric technology to go green.

 

ehrrr.... F1 KERS is a bit different area)))

 

I doubt we'll ever see anything like this. I thought about it before, but there are a lot of problems with peltier(TEC) devices. First of all, they're very expensive. It would be cheaper and more effective for manufacturers to spend the money on a better battery. The real problem, though, is the design of the peltier and its efficiency. The peltier can either pump heat from one surface to another(if you provide electrical power to the peltier), or it can convert heat energy into electrical energy(by creating a temperature different across two sufaces). If you've ever seen a peltier used in a desktop for cooling, you'll know that they draw a lot of power. They aren't very efficient. It takes a lot of electrical energy to pump a little bit of heat, and peltiers put out very little electrical power when a temperature difference exists across them.

Keep in mind that, assuming you want to put a peltier on your processor to convert heat energy back into electrical, you would need to keep the other side of the peltier cool. Most of the heat energy will flow right through the peltier and never be converted to electrical energy. The real problem with doing something like this is that you would end up frying your components. Heat would build up on the component side of the peltier, as a peltier makes a pretty good insulator. A peltier would only be a benefit for cooling if you pump electrical energy into it to move heat away from your components.

To put it simply, doing what you suggested is a bad idea. It would be expensive and likely damage your computer. It would also convert barely any heat into electrical energy and have no effect on battery life.

 

Well ok then. It just seemed like an interesting idea.