No1: Boom in thermoelectric element occurred every 20-25years

The first boom in the thermoelectric element occurred after RCA developed a prototype of a small refrigerator using thermoelectric elements in 1954. Then most of the major electronic manufacturers in USA such as GE and Westinghouse joined the development competition, and actively carried out development and trial manufacture of thermoelectric applied products aiming at commercialization. I would like to introduce a part of an article which was published in the magazine of'Air Conditioning and Refrigeration News' to have you realize the situation in those days. The title was'Thermoelectric Refrigeration Catches Nation's Interest' .

Discussion of thermoelectric refrigeration are no longer restricted to industrial circles. Consumer magazines, business journals, newspapers, even the Jack Paar television show are carrying news of this new technology and arousing public interest in its promises.

Then it introduced news from Detroit.

Westinghouse, in 1959, will market a thermoelectric appliance; In three to five years, something approaching the magnitude of a household refrigerator will be offered. Evans, who is manager of the section working on thermoelectric applications, emphasized at the Detroit Chapter of the American Society of Refrigerating Engineers that 'thermoelectric refrigeration is beyond the'maybe stage'. There is no question about its economic and technical feasibility for military use today--for domestic and commercial use soon.' On display at the meeting were the Westinghouse Hostess Cart and the Bottle Warmer-Cooler. The bottle device contains 50 thermo-elements, and the addition of more couples would permit it to pull down temperature faster, according to Evans.

We can also find other articles which told that' PITTSBURGH--Westinghouse Electric Corp. here is producing in commercial quantities, thermoelectric devices for industrial and military applications, it was disclosed here last week' ,' Westinghouse Electric Corp. is converting their compressor type refrigerator factory of 250,000 annual outputs to a thermoelectric refrigerator factory.' , and etc.. The enthusiasm and the expectation for the thermoelectric cooling in the United States at that time are strongly sensed.

These news prodded several Japanese companies including Komatsu towards the development of thermoelectric cooling technology as a dream device. Komatsu developed a domestic use air conditioner, a small refrigerator and a car air conditioner, but could not go forward to commercialize them because of the insufficient performance of the thermoelectric. Then we changed the emphasis to the development of industrial applications and introduced a low temperature isothermal bath, a dew point thermometer and a isothermal photographic developing pan to the market. A kit for the teaching materials was also offered for PR of the thermoelectric conversion. Sumitomo Electric Industries launched a thermoelectric cooler for the transistors in computers and seemed to have started the development of a drinking water cooler installed on the airplane. Sanyo Electric also entered into the thermoelectric cooler market with cooling cases for ampoules of various energy drinks and vitamin supplements at the drugstore. In around 1962, The Japanese Electronic Industry Development Association built a thermoelectric air conditioning room for demonstration of a 'dream room' at their office.
These activities showed how strongly the expectation for the thermoelectricity was raised in Japan. However, these dream products disappeared with time and the thermoelectric cooling went into the age of winter. The main reason was that the performance could not come up to the level of the compressor type cooling at all. (Please refer to the fourth story of the first volume)