SEEBECK - using the Seebeck effect to power sea-ice instrumentation

SEEBECK - 利用塞贝克效应为海冰仪器提供动力

• 批准号: NE/H002871/1
• 负责人: Mike Rose
• 金额: $ 4.05万
• 依托单位: British Antarctic Survey
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2010
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2010 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=NE%2FH002871%2F1
• 关键词: SEEBECK; using; Seebeck; effect; power

The ice is melting! Between 1979 and 2007 the summer sea ice extent in the Arctic has halved, from over 8 million square km to just over 4 million square km. Moreover, measurements from submarines suggest that its thickness has plummeted by some 40%. As to the future, there is unanimous agreement between all the climate prediction models used in the latest report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) that this reduction will continue, and that the Arctic could be ice free in summer by the end of this century. However, observations suggest that these models are significantly under-representing this reduction, in both space and time, and that the Arctic could become ice free as early as 2040. The models are wrong because we do not fully understand how sea ice grows, moves and decays. One reason for our ignorance is that the properties of sea ice are constantly evolving, driven by changes in local environmental conditions such as air temperature, snow depth, ocean temperature and so on. We simply do not have enough measurements, spread out over the Arctic and throughout the year, to refine our understanding and build and test better models. This is partly because of the combination of cost, difficult logistics and lack of man-power, and partly because we do not yet have cheap, simple and reliable automatic instruments that can be scattered round the Arctic in large numbers, and that can survive the long polar winter. A key problem, which we plan to address in this work, is how to power the instruments that we need during the polar winter, when there is no solar energy to call upon. Traditional solutions have employed wind generators and/or large car batteries, both of which are unreliable in the extreme conditions encountered. Batteries are also a pollution hazard which we could well do to minimise. We propose to develop, test and deploy thermo-electric generators that exploit the Seebeck Effect. Such generators, converting a flow of heat between a hot and a cold reservoir into electricity, have been widely used in the space industry, but have not been used so far in the polar regions. One problem is that the efficiency of the generator is quite small when the temperature difference between the 'hot' reservoir (the sea beneath the ice in our case) and the cold reservoir (the air above the sea ice) is only a few tens of degrees. However, modern polar instruments are very energy efficient and our calculations show that a Seebeck Effect generator of modest size will, in most cases, be able to supply sufficient energy during the winter months. Typical instruments consist of vertical chains of sensors (already being developed under NERC grants), connected to small satellite transmitters, that can be easily and opportunistically deployed through the ice by untrained operators. The measurements from these chains are being used to improve existing models of sea ice and its interaction with ocean and atmosphere: as such they will play an important role in elucidating the interaction between sea ice and global climate change.

冰在融化！从1979年到2007年，北极的夏季海冰面积减少了一半，从800多万平方公里减少到400多万平方公里，此外，潜艇的测量表明其厚度下降了约40%。至于未来，政府间气候变化专门委员会（IPCC）最新报告中使用的所有气候预测模型一致认为，这种减少将继续下去，到本世纪末，北极可能在夏季无冰。然而，观测结果表明，这些模式在空间和时间上都严重低估了这种减少，北极最早可能在2040年实现无冰。这些模型是错误的，因为我们并不完全了解海冰是如何生长、移动和衰减的。我们无知的一个原因是，海冰的性质是不断变化的，受当地环境条件（如气温、雪深、海洋温度等）变化的驱动。我们只是没有足够的测量，分布在北极和全年，来完善我们的理解，建立和测试更好的模型。这部分是由于成本、物流困难和缺乏人力的综合原因，部分是因为我们还没有廉价、简单和可靠的自动仪器，这些仪器可以大量分散在北极各地，并且可以经受住漫长的极地冬季。我们计划在这项工作中解决的一个关键问题是，在没有太阳能的极地冬季，如何为我们需要的仪器提供动力。传统的解决方案采用风力发电机和/或大型汽车电池，这两种方法在遇到极端条件时都不可靠。电池也是一种污染危害，我们完全可以尽量减少。我们建议开发、测试和部署利用塞贝克效应的热电发电机。这种发电机将冷热储层之间的热流转化为电能，已广泛用于航天工业，但迄今尚未在极地地区使用。一个问题是，当“热”储层（在我们的例子中是冰下的海水）和“冷”储层（海冰上方的空气）之间的温差只有几十度时，发电机的效率非常小。然而，现代极地仪器是非常节能的，我们的计算表明，在大多数情况下，中等大小的塞贝克效应发生器将能够在冬季提供足够的能量。典型的仪器由垂直的传感器链（已经在NERC的资助下开发）组成，连接到小型卫星发射器，未经训练的操作员可以很容易地在冰面上随意部署。来自这些链的测量结果正被用来改进现有的海冰及其与海洋和大气相互作用的模型：因此，它们将在阐明海冰与全球气候变化之间的相互作用方面发挥重要作用。