In this study, a smart heat pump, which could be used for the cooling of electronics, made of the laminated structure of thermoelectric (TE) and electrocaloric (EC) materials is studied. A simple arrangement of two TE layers sandwiched with one EC layer is modeled. This smart heat pump utilized the newly developed EC materials of giant adiabatic temperature change and the TE materials of high figure of merit, which has the advantages of no moving parts, made of solid state, operable over large working temperature difference, and can be formed into very small size. The operation of the device is numerically modelled considering the three major parametric effects: EC operation as function of time, electric current applied on TE, and temperature difference between the hot and cold sinks. The results on Coefficient of Performance (COP) and heat flow per unit area are discussed. This study validates the feasibility of TE-EC-TE laminated structure heat pump, and extends the understanding by further discussing the performance of structures with more laminated layers.
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