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Rankine Cycle with Regeneration

Our Purpose
In thermodynamic power cycles, an improvement of even 0.5% in overall cycle
efficiency is an important gain. One of the more common ways to improve the
efficiency of a steam cycle is to use regeneration, a process where heat is taken from
steam between turbine stages and used to heat water as it goes through pump stages.
Using CyclePad, we will modify a Rankine cycle and examine the effects of
regeneration on the cycle's thermal efficiency.

The basic Rankine cycle

We will compare our regenerative cycle to a typical Rankine cycle. The Rankine
cycle to which we will compare has the following parameters:

The operating limits are

• heater pressure of 5 MPa

• heater exit temperature of 400 C
• cooler pressure of 10 kPa

and its efficiencies are

• Carnot efficiency: 52.6%

• thermal efficiency: 36.2%

The regeneration cycle we examine will operate under the same limits. For reference,
the Rankine cycle layout is shown below.
 Figure 1: a Rankine cycle

(For more details on constructing the Rankine cycle, see the Rankine Cycle Setup
page.)

The Rankine Cycle with Rengeration

Improving cycle efficiencies

Improving cycle efficiency almost always involves making a cycle more like a Carnot
cycle operating between the same high and low temperature limits. The Carnot cycle
is maximally efficient, in part, because it receives all of its heat addition at the same
temperature, which is the highest temperature in the cycle. Similarly, it rejects all of
its heat at the same low temperature. The T-s diagram below details the working of a
Carnot cycle operating between the same temperature limits as our Rankine cycle.

Figure 2: Carnot cycle T-s diagram

Most cycles don't have all of their heat addition or rejection at one temperature. So,
when we look to improve a cycle's efficiency, we often consider the mean
temperature of heat addition, Ta and the mean temperature of heat rejection, Tr. These
reflect what the temperature would have been if the same amount of heat had been
added (or rejected) all at one temperature. They allow us to treat improving cycle
efficiencies as we would for a Carnot cycle: by raising Ta or lowering Tr. For
reversable heat transfer, the average temperature of heat addition is
Ta = Qin / ∆ S

and the average temperature of heat rejection is

Tr = Qout / ∆ S

For more efficient cycles, we would like to add heat at a higher temperature and reject
it at a lower temperature.

Figure 3: Rankine cycle T-s diagram

Knowing this, let's look at Figure 3. In the Rankine cycle, the above equations tell us
we are adding heat between states S4 and S1 at an average temperature of about 226.7
C. The heat rejection from S2 to S3 occurs at the cooler saturation temperature of 45.8
C. As a quick check, we can find the Rankine cycle's thermal efficiency by applying
the relation for Carnot efficiency to the mean Rankine cycle temperatures:
η = (Ta - Tr) / Ta = (226.7 - 45.8) / (226.7+273.15) = 36.2%

Which is the same answer we get applying the usual η = Wnet / Qhi relation.

How regeneration works

The idea behind regeneration is that we split the turbine into high-pressure and low-
pressure stages and do the same for the pump. Then, we can divert some of the heat in
the fluid as it leaves the high-pressure turbine and add it to the cool fluid leaving the
low-pressure pump, thereby sending fluid with a higher temperature to the heater.
We'll look at this in more detail in a minute, but now we know enough to construct
the Rankine cycle with regeneration.

Figure 4: a Rankine cycle with regeneration

Choosing regeneration assumptions

With the design layout complete, we turn to adding the assumptions which allow
CyclePad to solve the cycle. For this example, there are four places where we have to
make new assumptions: the outlet of the high-pressure turbine (S2), the splitter
(SPL1), the outlet of the low-pressure pump (PMP2), and the inlet of the high-
pressure pump (PMP1). We will look at each of these in turn.

The High-Pressure Turbine Outlet (S2)

What pressure do we choose for the extracted feedwater? We don't know yet, so we'll
choose 200 kPa, which gives the two turbines pressure ratios of 25 and 20. This
makes them roughly equal and keeps either one from having an astronomically high
pressure ratio. (The original Rankine cycle had a turbine PR equal to 500!) Later,
when we have the cycle solved and we can let CyclePad do sensitivity analyses, we
will see if another pressure works better.

The Splitter (SPL1)

The splitter is used to draw some of the working fluid from the high-pressure turbine
stage and direct it towards the mixer. The assumption we make here is that the splitter
is isoparametric. This means that the stuff exiting the splitter is the same as the stuff
entering it.

Quick Note

The other assumption is that the splitter is not isoparametric. This simulates situations
when we use a special splitter that allows us to separate the saturated mixture into two
streams that each have different proportions of liquid and vapor. For instance, we
could split 1 kg/sec, 60% quality stream into a pair of 0.4 kg/sec, 0% quality and a 0.6
kg/sec, 100% quality streams. This allows each stream to have different specific
properties (v, h, and so on), though they still have the same temperature and pressure.

We might think that this would be advantageous to regeneration so that we could send
only saturated vapor (which has higher enthalpy) to the low-pressure turbine and get
more work out of it and send the low quality remainder down to heat the water
entering the high-pressure pump. So why not do this? Let's try it. We can retract the
isoparametric assumption and instead assume the stuff entering the low-pressure
turbine is a saturated vapor. Then when our other assumptions for this cycle have
been made, we will see that the efficiency has changed by a few hundredths of a
percent and we see that such an approach does not improve cycle efficiency by much.
Our high-pressure pump condition (S6 below) requires that the total enthalpy H (not
h) entering the high-pressure pump is constant, so the lower quality of the steam
entering the mixer requires a higher mass flow into the mixer, nearly negating the
benefit of the higher h steam that enters the low-pressure turbine. That is, we could
send lower h stuff to the pump, but we'd have to send more of it. Of course, any
efficiency improvement is better than none, but it isn't always realistic to assume that
we can use the special splitter than separates vapor from liquid, so we'll continue
using the isoparametric splitter.

The Low-pressure Pump Outlet (S5)

What pressure should the water at this state have? This water, which enters the pump
at the cooler pressure, needs to be pumped up to the pressure of the water extracted
from the high-pressure turbine. This is a matter of simple hydrostatics: if we make it
lower, the higher pressure extract water will flow backward through the low-pressure
pump and, if we make it higher, the low pressure pump water will flow backward
through the splitter.

We could just set this pressure at 200 kPa, the pressure we set at the high-pressure
turbine outlet. However, the better approach is to tell CyclePad to make the two
pressures equal, using the "Equate T(S5) to another parameter" option. This way,
when we need to experiment with different feedwater pressures, we don't need to
make the change in two places. Another equivalent solution is to declare MXR1 to be
isobaric.

The High-Pressure Pump Inlet (S6)

Our whole purpose in adding heat to this water is to raise its temperature before it
enters the heater and improve the cycle efficiency. The water exiting the low-pressure
pump is only at 46 C and the water entering the heater in the original Rankine cycle
was at about the same temperature (adding pressure to an incompressible fluid doesn't
raise its temperature much). How high can we heat the water to improve this?

The only limit we really need to consider is the practical use of the pump. We make
sure the water entering the pump in a simple Rankine cycle is a saturated fluid
because pumps cannot handle vapor very well. We have the same consideration here.
We want to heat this water up as much as we can, but not so much that some of it
starts to vaporize again. We recall that this is the state of a saturated liquid. This is our
assumption for the high-pressure pump inlet: it is saturated with quality = 0.

Examining regeneration efficiencies

The Effect on Cycle Efficiency

We now have made the changes needed to add a regeneration stage to our Rankine
cycle. Here are the new efficiencies and the ones of the plain Rankine cycle for
comparison. Also shown is the percent gain in power output of the modified cycle
when supplied with the same heat as the unmodified Rankine cycle and the mean
temperatures of heat addition for both cycles.

Unmodified Rankine Rankine Cycle

Cycle Efficiencies Cycle with Regeneration
Carnot efficiency 52.6% 52.6%
Thermal efficiency 36.2% 38.4%
% Increase in Power Generation 0% 6.1%
mean temperature of heat addition 226.7 C 251.5 C

Varying Feedwater Pressure

Can we do even better? We made only one decision that was somewhat arbitrary in
picking numbers, choosing the outlet pressure of the high-pressure turbine so that the
two turbines would have similar (and low) pressure ratios. However, while that is a
worthwhile choice considering the economics of turbine purchasing, it may not yield
the optimal cycle efficiency.

We can examine the relationship between the thermal efficiency of our regenerative
cycle and the feedwater pressure (the pressure at S2). The sensitivity analysis looks
like this
 Figure 5: Effect of varying feedwater pressure on
cycle efficiency of Rankine cycle with regeneration.

There appears to be an optimal pressure at about 500 kPa. It is important to pay

attention to the scale of the graph, though, because, while there may be an increase in
efficiency by changing the pressure, the efficiencies shown vary by roughly 0.1%,
which may not justify the higher pressure ratio (about 50) needed in the low-pressure
turbine to accommodate a feedwater pressure of 500 kPa.

Adding Further Regeneration Stages

Of course, the limit on the improvement made by the regeneration stage seems to be
that we can only add so much heat to the fluid entering the high-pressure pump before
the fluid begins to evaporate, damaging the pump. At higher pressures, the working
fluid can contain more heat before it begins to boil away. So, we could repeat the
process several times: add some heat until boiling almost occurs, then pump to a
higher pressure, then add more heat, and so on.

For instance, by adding another regeneration stage to the design above, and hunting a
little to find good feedwater pressures, we can improve the cycle's thermal efficiency
to about 39.5%, which is a significant improvement from the 38.4% with one
regeneration stage. A third regeneration stage brings the efficiency to just over 40%.
How far can this go? For a Rankine cycle where the steam enters the boiler as a
superheated gas, we can never achieve the efficiency of the Carnot cycle, even with
an infinite number of regeneration stages. (If the steam entered the turbine as a
saturated vapor, we could, in theory, achieve Carnot efficiency with infinite
regeneration stages, but such cycles are impractical for other reasons besides the need
for infinite stages.)
The real limit is economic, since having the extra extraction stages and pumps adds to
the cost of the plant. At some point, the cost of the extra equipment outweighs the
savings due to increased cycle efficiency. Practical plants seldom have more than five
regeneration stages.

CyclePad Design Files

• Download the CyclePad design of the Rankine cycle from here.
• Download the CyclePad design of the Rankine cycle with one
regeneration stage from here.
• Download the CyclePad design of the Rankine cycle with one
regeneration stage at the optimal pressure from here.
• Download the CyclePad design of the Rankine cycle with two
regeneration stages from here.

Related Entries
• Design of a Rankine Cycle
• Rankine Cycle with Reheat

Sources
Whalley, P.B. 1992. Basic Engineering Thermodynamics. Oxford University Press.
ISBN: 0-19-856255-1

Haywood, R.W. 1980. Analysis of Engineering Cycles. Pergamon Press. ISBN: 0-08-
025440-3

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Contributed by: M. E. Brokowski

Initial Entry: 12/10/97
Last Edited: 12/15/97
For comments or suggestions please contact CyclePad-librarian@cs.northwestern.edu