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US 5,027,602 AGranted
Heat engine, refrigeration and heat pump cycles approximating the Carnot cycle and apparatus therefor
AssigneeAtomic Energy of Canada Limited
InventorsJohn S. Glen, Thomas C. Edwards
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A process and apparatus by means of which the premier vapor cycle, known as the Carnot cycle, can be approximated in practice, involve the application of novel energy-efficient, mixed phase, high volume-ratio fluid-handling machinery to a single-component working fluid that exists during certain processes as a mixture of fine droplets of saturated liquid in saturated vapor. This combination of fluid-handling machinery and the saturated mixed-phase working fluid enables the approximation of isentropic saturated liquid/vapor expansion and compression. These process approximations, in addition to isothermal heat addition and rejection, enable Carnot heat engine, refrigeration and heat pump cycles to be approximated.
Claims29
A heat engine cycle comprising:
- (a) compressing in a compressor a dual-phase working fluid in the form of a mixture of fine droplets of saturated liquid in saturated vapour;
- (b) heating the working fluid as compressed in step (a) under substantially isothermal conditions while vaporizing the working fluid;
- (c) expanding the heated working fluid provided by step (b) in an expander to produce a work output while the working fluid, during at least an initial portion of the expansion, is in the form of a mixture of fine droplets of saturated liquid in saturated vapour;
- (d) cooling and partially condensing the working fluid after the expansion step (c) under substantially isothermal conditions to provide a dual-phase working fluid mixture of saturated vapour and saturated liquid for compression in step (a);
- and
- (e) repeating the steps (a)-(d) recited above in a continuous cycle.
3 more elements
An approximate Carnot heat engine cycle including the steps of:
- (a) compressing a working fluid in a compressor the working fluid being comprised of a saturated liquid saturated vapour mixture created by feeding the saturated vapour component into an inlet of the compressor together with a fine mist or spray of the saturated liquid component so that heat transfer occurs during the compression process across the liquid-vapour boundaries defined by the finely divided mixture of vapour and liquid and so that the compression of this mixture proceeds under approximately isentropic conditions until a desired degree of compression is achieved;
- (b) heating the compressed working fluid produced by step (a) under substantially isothermal conditions to vaporize a substantial portion of the working fluid to produce a two-phase saturated liquid-saturated vapour mixture;
- (c) expanding the heated two-phase working fluid produced in step (b) in an expander to produce a work output from the expander by feeding the vapour phase into the expander together with a fine spray or mist of the saturated liquid phase so that heat transfer occurs during the expansion process across the liquid-vapour boundaries defined by the finely divided mixture of vapour and liquid and so that the expansion proceeds under approximately isentropic conditions until a preselected pressure is reached;
- (d) cooling and partially condensing the working fluid at the pre-selected pressure of step (c) under substantially isothermal conditions to reduce the quality of the resulting saturated vapour and saturated liquid mixture to a selected point for compression in step (a), and
- (e) repeating steps (a) through (d) as a continuous cycle.
2 more elements
A heat engine comprising:
- (a) a compressor having an inlet and an outlet and adapted for receiving and compressing a dual-phase working fluid in the form of a mixture of fine droplets of saturated liquid in saturated vapour;
- (b) a boiler having an inlet and an outlet and connected to receive the working fluid from the compressor via the boiler inlet for heating the working fluid under substantially isothermal conditions so that the saturated liquid phase is converted gradually to vapour through the addition of heat;
- (c) a boiler outlet line to carry a flow of heated working fluid from the boiler outlet to an expander inlet;
- (d) an expander having said inlet and an outlet and adapted for receiving and expanding the heated working fluid provided by said boiler to produce a work output while the working fluid during at least a substantial initial portion of the expansion is in the form of a dual phase mixture of fine droplets of saturated liquid in saturated vapour;
- (e) a condenser having an inlet and an outlet, said condenser having its inlet connected to the expander outlet for receiving and cooling and partially condensing the working fluid after the expansion in the expander to provide a dual-phase working fluid comprising saturated vapour and saturated liquid of pre-selected quality;
- and
- (f) a compressor inlet line to carry the flow of working fluid from the condenser outlet to the compressor inlet to provide for operation in a closed continuous cycle.
4 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.