Electronic carnot engine extends HEV range

Range extenders will also feature in buses, military vehicles and boats, which IDTechEx says will create a major market. Today's range extenders consist of little more than off-the-shelf internal combustion engines. They are being replaced by 2^nd gen range extenders - piston engines designed from scratch for fairly constant load. Next, advanced rotary combustion engines such as the Libralato in the UK are coming center stage with trials and rollouts in cars and planes.

Fuel generator range extenders have no separate shaft to a generator. Elegantly, they produce electricity directly. A rotary combustion engine has been made in this way and fuel cells also act as fuel generators, as do the experimental free-piston engines that have oscillating pistons within magnets and coils. The ECE of KanLabs also comes in this category. Indeed, it has no moving parts, just producing electricity directly from heat.

Thermoelectric harvesting produces electricity from heat difference though ECE is not thermoelectric in action. It is an "external combustion thermal engine". Through thermal cycles of free-electrons in a metal or semiconductor, KanLabs says its ECE converts thermal energy into electricity with high efficiency, reporting that its ECE for bikes, boats, robots and planes has three key components: a thermal converter, an inductor/capacitor resonant tank and a controller/ switch. Between +100 and +850°C, net thermal efficiency should be 42%, as computed by KanLabs, way ahead of thermoelectrics.

The IDTechEx report, Range Extenders for Electric Vehicles Land, Water & Air 2015-2025 compares all range extenders and forecasts the lower power needed over the years, given assistance from fast charging and energy harvesting innovations ahead, including thermoelectrics. It forecasts the market over the coming ten years. Every aspect of range extenders is covered.