Abstract
Thermoelectric generator can be converted directly into electrical energy to thermal energy. In addition, because there is no moving parts, electrical energy obtained efficiently from a very small temperature difference. That is, thermoelectric devices can contribute to energy-harvesting technology by converting wasted heat into electric power. Monolithic oxide-metal composite thermoelectric generators were fabricated using multilayer co-fired ceramics technology. These devices consisted of Ni_<0.9>Mo_<0.1> and La_<0.035>Sr_<0.965>TiO_3 as p- and n-type thermoelectric materials, and Y_<0.03>Zr(0.97)O_2 was used as an insulator, sandwiched between p- and n-type layers. To co-fire dissimilar materials, p-type layers contained 20 wt% La_<0.035>Sr_<0.965>TiO_3; thus, these were oxide-metal composite layers. The fabricated device had 50 pairs of p-i-n junctions of 5.9 mm × 7.0 mm × 2.6 mm. The calculated maximum value of the electric power output from the device was 100 μW at ΔT = 10 K and operated a radio frequency (RF) transmitter circuit module assumed to be a sensor network system.
