(MDPI, 2020) Catalán Ros, Leyre; Garacochea Sáenz, Amaia; Casi Satrústegui, Álvaro; Araiz Vega, Miguel; Aranguren Garacochea, Patricia; Astrain Ulibarrena, David; Ingeniaritza; Institute of Smart Cities - ISC; Ingeniería
Although there is an important lack of commercial thermoelectric applications mainly
due to their low efficiency, there exist some cases in which thermoelectric generators are the best
option thanks to their well-known advantages, such as reliability, lack of maintenance and scalability.
In this sense, the present paper develops a novel thermoelectric application in order to supply
power to volcanic monitoring stations, making them completely autonomous. These stations
become indispensable in any volcano since they are able to predict eruptions. Nevertheless, they
present energy supply difficulties due to the absence of power grid, the remote access, and the
climatology. As a solution, this work has designed a new integral system composed of thermoelectric
generators with high efficiency heat exchangers, and its associated electronics, developed thanks to
Internet of Things (IoT) technologies. Thus, the heat emitted from volcanic fumaroles is transformed
directly into electricity with thermoelectric generators with passive heat exchangers based on phase
change, leading to a continuous generation without moving parts that powers different sensors,
the information of which is emitted via LoRa. The viability of the solution has been demonstrated both
at the laboratory and at a real volcano, Teide (Canary Islands, Spain), where a compact prototype has
been installed in an 82 C fumarole. The results obtained during more than eight months of operation
prove the robustness and durability of the developed generator, which has been in operation without
maintenance and under several kinds of meteorological conditions, leading to an average generation
of 0.49W and a continuous emission over more than 14 km.
