Second Law Analysis of a Novel Combined Cooling and Power Cycle With Water Harvesting

The first and second laws of thermodynamics were used to analyze a novel cooling and power cycle that combines a semi-closed cycle called the High Pressure Regenerative Turbine Engine (HPRTE) with a vapor absorption refrigeration system (VARS). Waste heat from the recirculated combustion gas of the HPRTE is used to power the absorption refrigeration unit, which cools the high-pressure compressor inlet of the HPRTE to below ambient conditions and also produces excess refrigeration in an amount that depends on ambient conditions. The cycle is modeled using steady-state thermodynamics, with state-of-the-art polytropic efficiencies and pressure drops for the turbo-machinery and heat exchangers, and accurate correlations for the properties of the NH3-water mixture and the combustion products. Exergy analyses were performed for all the components of the cycle to examine the losses and identify critical plant devices considering different operating conditions. Water produced as a product of combustion is intentionally condensed in the evaporator of the VARS, which is designed to provide sufficient cooling for: the inlet air to the high pressure compressor, water extraction and for an external load. The cycle is shown to operate with a thermal efficiency approaching 46% for a turbine inlet temperature of 1400°C while producing about 1.5 kg of water for each kg of fuel (propane) consumed. The thermal efficiency does not take into account the cooling effect produced in the evaporator of VARS. The combined cycle efficiency at the above operating condition was found to be 49%. Low emissions are also possible on liquid fuels and not just on natural gas. It should be noted that the values of efficiencies obtained are for a medium sized engine with conservative values of the design parameters. It is observed that the largest contribution to the total cycle irreversibility comes from the combustor and accounts for 85% of the total exergy loss. The generator of the vapor absorption refrigeration system is the next largest quantity, accounting for about 3.4% of the total exergy loss. The mass of water extracted from the system increases as the value of the low-pressure compressor ratio is increased. However, this rate of increase is more when the compressor ratio is increased from 1.0 to 2.0 and less as the compressor ratio is further increased. Based on these and prior results, which showed that the HPRTE is very compact and has inherently low emissions, it appears that this cycle would be ideally suited for distributed power and vehicle applications, especially ones with associated air conditioning loads.