Youre right. I did not explain my point very well. But there most certainly is "waste," at least in this engineer's opinion of what "waste" is. And yes, if you disconnect all loads, no mechanical loss thru the alternator occurs. But my point is that these chips are more efficient (so I hear, I'm still skeptical about them) than running freon compressors. In which case, not as much of a load is required, which pushed you up on the efficiency curve, thus conserving energy.
It's hard to explain, and I don't know the ins and outs of what these kids are exploring. None of us do. So I don't think we should slam it, as many people here are doing. At the very least, it's a learning experience.
I wish I could say I knew a lot about the chips, I don't. I do know a lot about air-conditioning and a lot about generating electricity.
Generating heat from electrical resistance is much more power hungry than moving heat by pumping it around using a compressor. I would think that at least theoretically it could be more efficient to move that heat around with electronic devices because you don't have to over come the frictional losses from the inside of the compressor and the belts. So far the most economical belt invented still dissipates 2% of the power it transfers and most belts consume 6-7% of the power transferred. Just losing the belts would be a big help. Considering all the internal friction of a compressor and the energy required to move the gas around makes me think there might be something to all of this, I certainly hope so.