In many heat recovery processes, temperature control of heat source is often required to ensure safety and high efficiency of the heat source equipment. In addition, the management of recovered heat is important for the proper use of waste heat. To this aim, the concept of thermal management controller (TMC), which can vary heat transfer rate via the volume variation of non-condensable gas, was presented. Theoretical model and experimental prototype were established. Investigation shows that the prototype is effective in temperature control. With water as the working fluid, the vapor temperature variation is only 1.3 ℃ when the heating power varies from 2.5 to 10.0 kW. In variable working conditions, this TMC can automatically adjust thermal allocation to the heat consumer.