BSST

United Technologies BSST's mission is to provide highly efficient, effective, and practical solid-state temperature control and power generation solutions to industry, while continuing to advance the leading edge performance of its technology through sustained research and development. Joint development efforts with leaders in major application markets throughout the world aid in this process.

Through extensive R&D and experience, BSST has developed a breakthrough advance in TE technology, improving the efficiency by an approximate factor of two. Multiple key patents related to this technology have been issued or allowed.

Compared to standard TE technology, this breakthrough:

  • Provides double the efficiency
  • Nearly doubles the maximum change in temperature achievable
  • Reduces weight, size and cost
  • Enables demisting and decontamination
  • Benefits from emerging higher power density materials

BSST is working with academic and industrial researchers to facilitate their work toward material improvements that could double the efficiency again.  This material gain, when coupled with BSST's thermal isolation would improve the efficiency of the thermoelectric by a factor of four. With that degree of improvement, a number of practical commercial applications such as space heating and cooling can out-perform conventional vapor phase transition methods.

In addition to these achievements, BSST is advancing the use of thermoelectrics in the area of power generation. Used in reverse, thermoelectrics can generate power by converting thermal energy, such as the waste heat from an automobile exhaust, into an electrical current. Just as in heating and cooling applications, traditionally designed TE devices lack the efficiency for practical applications of power generation. BSST’s research and development efforts promise improvements through innovative structures and arrangements of the TE materials.
BSST’s research and development over the past five years has resulted in the following intellectual property achievements:

  • 9 allowed patents
  • 10 U.S. patent applications