Boosting thermoelectric efficiency using time-dependent control

TL;DR

This paper introduces a theoretical framework demonstrating that time-dependent control can significantly enhance thermoelectric efficiency beyond traditional thermodynamic constraints, converting waste heat into useful electricity.

Contribution

It proposes a novel method using external time-dependent forcing to bypass thermodynamic limits on thermoelectric efficiency, supported by a robust theoretical model.

Findings

Efficiency can be substantially increased with time-dependent control.

Control energy is effectively used to convert waste heat into electricity.

The approach is robust against nonlinear interactions.

Abstract

Thermoelectric efficiency is defined as the ratio of power delivered to the load of a device to the rate of heat flow from the source. Till date, it has been studied in presence of thermodynamic constraints set by the Onsager reciprocal relation and the second law of thermodynamics that severely bottleneck the thermoelectric efficiency. In this study, we propose a pathway to bypass these constraints using a time-dependent control and present a theoretical framework to study dynamic thermoelectric transport in the far from equilibrium regime. The presence of a control yields the sought after substantial efficiency enhancement and importantly a significant amount of power supplied by the control is utilised to convert the wasted-heat energy into useful-electric energy. Our findings are robust against nonlinear interactions and suggest that external time-dependent forcing, which can be incorporated with existing devices, provides a beneficial scheme to boost thermoelectric efficiency.