4. Modeling thermoelectric devices

Onsager's formalism provides a local description of the coupling mechanisms of flows and potentials. From an application point of view, it's easier to consider an average macroscopic model that directly implements the system's technological parameters. In its general form, the system (figure 3 ) is made up of :

• two thermostats at two different temperatures ;

• two heat exchangers;

• a thermoelectric cell, composed of N thermoelectric material elements electrically in series and thermally in parallel.