ABSTRACT
Car and truck customers expect new vehicles to o¤er improved e´ciency, better durability, and more features than their previous vehicles. To meet these customer expectations, automotive manufacturers are searching for a wide variety of new technologies to incorporate into new vehicles. One technology getting increased attention is thermoelectric technology because it can be key to providing several customer-desired features. Most thermoelectric applications can be divided into one of two segments. One segment is based on the Peltier e¤ect and is focused on various applications of heating or cooling. At this time, a few heating and cooling applications represent the only use of thermoelectric technology in production cars and trucks. še other segment is based on the Seebeck e¤ect and provides electric power generation using a temperature di¤erential. Because of the growing need to reduce fuel consumption in cars and trucks, there is increased interest in thermoelectric power generation using waste heat. še heating and cooling applications will be addressed ›rst because some of these applications are already in production.
