Energy Efficiency Impact of Localized Cooling

Traditional vehicle air conditioning systems are designed to cool the entire cabin to provide passenger comfort. Localized cooling, on the other hand, focuses on keeping the passenger comfortable by creating a micro climate around the passenger. Such a system also easily adapts to the number of passengers in the car and enables zonal control. The net impact of the localized cooling is that equivalent comfort can be achieved at reduced HVAC energy consumption rate.

The present paper reports on a vehicle implementation of localized cooling using Thermoelectric Devices and the resulting energy saving.