Power generation process
AssigneeSaltkraft ApS
InventorsHenrik Tækker Madsen, Steen Søndergaard Nissen
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Abstract
A process for generating power from a warm saline steam (1) obtained from geothermal sources. The process involves converting latent osmotic energy present in the stream (1) into an increase in the total pressure of said stream by passing through an osmotic pump unit (7). The stream is passed over a semi-permeable membrane (8) and a lower salinity steam (14) is passed over the other side of said membrane (8), such that the need for mechanical pumping in subsequent process steps is reduced.
Claims19
A power generation process, the process comprising the steps of:
- extracting a saline stream from a geothermal formation;
- converting latent osmotic energy present in the saline stream into an increase in the total pressure of said saline stream by passage through an osmotic pump unit in which said saline stream is passed over one side of a semi-permeable membrane which permits the passage of water but not the passage of salts, an aqueous stream of lower salinity than said saline stream being passed over the other side of said membrane, wherein an output from the osmotic pump unit is a higher-pressure stream derived from the saline stream;
- and
- increasing a total pressure of a low-pressure stream by passing the low-pressure stream through a first side of a pressure exchanger and passing the higher-pressure stream through a second side of the pressure exchanger such that energy represented by the increase in the total pressure of said saline stream does work on the low-pressure stream to increase the total pressure of that low-pressure stream above a predetermined level.
A power generation system comprising:
- a connection to a warm saline stream extracted from a geothermal formation;
- an osmotic pump unit arranged to increase a total pressure of a high-salinity input derived from said warm saline stream using a difference in salinity between said high-salinity input and a low-salinity input stream thereby producing a high-pressure output stream, the power generation system is arranged such that said increase in the total pressure reduces the need for mechanical pumping in subsequent process steps;
- and
- a pressure exchanger configured to transfer energy represented by the increase in the total pressure to a second, different, stream to increase a pressure of the second stream above a predetermined level.
A power generation process, the process comprising the steps of:
- extracting a saline stream from a geothermal formation;
- converting latent osmotic energy present in the saline stream into an increase in the total pressure of said saline stream by passage through an osmotic pump unit in which said saline stream is passed over one side of a semi-permeable membrane which permits the passage of water but not the passage of salts, an aqueous streamof lower salinity than said saline stream being passed over the other side of said membrane, wherein an output from the osmotic pump unit is a higher-pressure stream derived from the saline stream;
- and
- increasing a total pressure of a low-pressure stream by passing the low-pressure stream through a first side of a pressure exchanger and passing the higher-pressure stream through a second side of the pressure exchanger such that energy represented by the increase in the total pressure of said saline stream does work on the low-pressure stream to increase the total pressure of that low-pressure stream above a predetermined level;
- and in which the saline stream has a temperature of at least 45° C. and the saline stream has a salt content of at least 10%wt.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.