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Renewable Energy
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/renene
Department of Naval Architecture and Ocean Engineering, National Kaohsiung Marine University, Taiwan, ROC
Department of Marine Engineering, National Kaohsiung Marine University, Taiwan, ROC
a r t i c l e i n f o
a b s t r a c t
Article history:
Received 29 August 2013
Accepted 26 January 2014
Available online 16 February 2014
This study quantied the effects of evaporation temperature, condensation temperature, and the inletand outlet-temperature differences of deep cold seawater and warm seawater on the performance of an
ocean thermal energy conversion (OTEC) plant using an organic Rankine cycle (ORC), and also investigated the optimal operations required for the performance. A nite-temperature-difference heat transfer
method is developed to evaluate the objective parameter, which is the ratio of net power output to the
total heat transfer area of heat exchanger in the system, and R717, R600a, R245fa, R152a, and R134a were
used as the working uids. The optimal evaporation and condensation temperatures were obtained
under various conditions for maximal objective parameters in an OTEC system.
The results show that R717 performed optimally in objective parameter evaluation among the ve
working uids, and that R600a performed better than other uids in thermal efciency analysis. The
optimal seawater temperature differences between the inlet and outlet of the evaporator and condenser
are proposed. Furthermore, the inuences of inlet temperatures of warm and cold seawater in the ORC
are presented for an OTEC plant. The simulation results should enable the performance of an ORC system
to be compared when using various organic working uids.
2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords:
OTEC
ORC
Optimal
Evaporation
Condensation
Performance
1. Introduction
Saving energy and reducing carbon dioxide emissions have
become increasingly critical aspects of energy usage because of
concerns regarding energy shortage, global warming, and environmental pollution. Thus, researchers have extensively investigated approaches to use renewable and sustainable energy sources
effectively. The ocean thermal energy conversion (OTEC) process
uses the disparity in temperature between the warm seawater on
the ocean surface and the deep cold seawater to operate a Rankine
cycle system for producing electrical power without consuming
fuel or emitting carbon [1e3]. Although using ocean thermal energy has enormous potential and the OTEC plants have a small
environment impact, the low net efciency of OTEC resulting from
the lower temperature differences between surface seawater and
cold seawater restricts the implementation of this technology [4].
To improve the thermal efciency of OTEC, suitable working
uids for use in the Rankine cycle must be identied. Ammonia,
which is named R717, was used in the OTEC system widely in the
past because of its excellent thermodynamic properties. Uehara
* Corresponding author. No.142, Haizhuan Rd., Nanzi Dist., Kaohsiung City 81157,
Taiwan, ROC. Tel.: 886 7 3617141x3404; fax: 886 7 3656481.
E-mail address: mhyang@webmail.nkmu.edu.tw (M.-H. Yang).
0960-1481/$ e see front matter 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2014.01.029
26
Fig. 1. (a). Schematic diagram of the OTEC plant using ORC system. (b). Temperature and entropy diagram of the OTEC plant using ORC system.
27
Fig. 3. Comparisons of Wver and previous work [9] under various warm seawater ow
rates for R717 in an OTEC system.
an OTEC system that involves generating hydrogen from a pureammonia working uid. Baik et al. [20] simulated the power optimization in ORC by using R125, R134a, R245fa, and R152a; in their
analysis, the heat-source and heat-sink temperatures were
assumed to be 100 C and 20 C, respectively. The total overall
conductance, which is the product of the overall heat transfer coefcient and the heat transfer area, of the evaporator and
condenser ranged from 20 to 80 kW/K. The results revealed that the
R125 trans-critical cycle performed better than the other working
uids, because the total overall conductance was more than 35 kW/
K. However, the variations of the heat transfer coefcient and the
area of the heat exchangers were not described further.
Few studies have analyzed the optimal operational conditions
with respect to working uids while considering both maximal net
power output and minimal heat transfer area. The aim of this study
is to investigate the performance of the objective parameters that
represent the ratio of net power output to heat transfer area for an
ORC system with various evaporating and condensing temperatures. In this study, the preliminary principles for selecting working
uids are the environmental considerations of zero ozone depletion potential and low global warming potential. From the rst law
of thermodynamics and the heat transfer theory, the maximal
objective parameters and their corresponding optimal condensing
and evaporating temperatures are obtained for using R134a, R152a,
R245fa, R600a, and R717 as working uids.
2. Cycle description and analysis
The ORC in an OTEC plant consists mainly of a pump, an evaporator, a turbine, and a condenser, as shown in Fig. 1(a). In the
evaporator, the working uid absorbs heat that is transferred from
the warm seawater and reaches saturation temperature, after
which the working uid continues to be heated and thereby becomes a saturated vapor at the outlet of the evaporator. The vapor
expands while passing through the turbine and produces power
because of the pressure difference of evaporation and condensation. The low-pressure vapor then enters the condenser cooled by
cold deep seawater. After condensation, the liquid working uid is
pumped back into the evaporator to complete the cycle. In the OTEC
Fig. 4. Dependence of (a) Wnet, (b) At, and (c) g on evaporation temperatures at
Tcon 10.7 C and DTw 2.1 C.
28
Table 1
The properties of working uids.
R717
R134a
R245fa
R152a
R600a
1
1=ho Ao =ht Ao =Ai 1=hi
Qeva mr i2 i1
(1)
where i1, i2 are the enthalpies of the working uid at the inlets of
the evaporator and the turbine, respectively. In the turbine, the
power output from the working uid can be shown as
Wout
mr i3 i2
ht
(2)
Qcon mr i3 i4
(3)
Wp
mr v4 p1 p4
hp
(4)
ho 55Prr
kw
Dh
ht
2pkt Lt
lnDo =Di
(5)
DTmean;e
(10)
11=4
grf rf rg k3r i0fg
A
ho 0:729@
mf Tsat Tw Do
0
(11)
where rf and rg are the liquid and vapor densities of the working
uid, Tsat represents the condensation temperature in condenser,
and i0fg is the modied latent heat of the working uid. The total
heat-exchanger area of the condenser and evaporator in ORC can be
obtained by
(12)
Qe Ue Ae F DTmean;e
(9)
where n 0.4 is for the condenser and n 0.3 is for the evaporator.
The corresponding heat transfer coefcient of the tube wall is
calculated as
At Ac Ae
3. Solution method
(7)
(6)
where Twwi and Twwo are the inlet and outlet temperatures of warm
seawater, respectively, and Tri and Tro are the working uid inlet and
Dpw f
2
Lw rw Vw
Dw 2
(13)
Wwp
mw Dpw
rw hp
(14)
(15)
hth
Wnet
Qeva
29
(16)
Wnet
At
(17)
Fig. 5. Dependence of (a) Wnet, (b) At, and (c) g on condensation temperatures at
Teva 22.3 C and DTw 2.1 C.
30
Fig. 6. Contours of g for (a) R717, (b) R134a, (c) R245fa, (d) R152a and (e) R600a with DTw 2.1 C.
total heat transfer area, At, rises gradually initially and later increases steeply, which is because the temperature difference between warm seawater and the working uid decreases in the
evaporator. Fig. 4(b) shows that the At curve of R245fa performs
highest value among the working uids because R245fa has the
poorest heat transfer properties as shown in Table 1. Notably, the At
curve of R717 is the smallest because R717 has the largest latent
heat and thermal conductivity. Fig. 4(c) demonstrates the effects of
Teva on g, which is the ratio of net power output to total heat
transfer area of the OTEC system. For all working uids, the values
31
Fig. 7. The inuences of DTw on (a) Teva,o and Tcon,o and (b) corresponding gmax at
Twci 5 C and Twwi 28 C.
Table 2
The gmax and its corresponding to Teva,o, Tcon,o and DTw,o for an OTEC system with
Tcwi 5 C and Twwi 28 C.
Teva,o ( C)
Tcon,o ( C)
DTw,o ( C)
gmax (kW/m2)
R717
R134a
R245fa
R152a
R600a
22.32
10.78
1.61
0.2068
22.6
11.02
1.56
0.1157
22.41
10.69
1.58
0.1011
22.62
10.98
1.591.5
0.1282
22.75
11.13
0.1283
32
Fig. 8. The inuences of Tcwi on (a) Tcon,o, (b) Teva,o, (c) gmax, and (d) hth at Twwi 28 C.
uid. The results in these gures show that the gmax values from
high to low are for R717, R152a, R600a, R134a, and R245fa. The
values of gmax for R152a and R600a are close both in variation of
Twci and Twwi. By contrast, the values hth, which correspond to gmax,
from high to low are for R600a, R717 R152a, R245fa, and R134a,
respectively. From these results, one can deduce that R245fa performs worst in object parameter analysis, and R134a has the lowest
net thermal efciency for an OTEC system. These results also
indicate that R600a is most suitable for operating at high evaporating and condensing temperatures in an OTEC system.
To analyze the application of seawater thermal energy in the
OTEC system, the variation of optimal seawater temperature difference DTw,o in relation to Twci and Twwi are shown in Fig. 10(a) and
(b). It should be noted that in this study, the temperature differences, DTw, between the inlet and outlet for warm seawater of the
evaporator, and for cold seawater of the condenser, are assumed to
the same. The DTw,o of the OTEC system with R717 are both the
highest among corresponding values for all the working uids at
various Twci and Twwi, because of the high thermal conductivity, as
explained before. It is interesting to demonstrate that compared
with other working uids, the OTEC system has lowest DTw,o with
R600a both at various Twci and Twwi. This phenomenon also reveals
that the thermal energy absorbed from warm seawater and discharged to cold seawater is the lowest for R600a even though
R600a has the highest thermal efciency. Furthermore, DTw
increased slightly with Twwi but decreased markedly with Twci,
because lower cold seawater temperature increases pump power
consumption obviously. This result also indicates that the coldseawater inlet temperature, Twci, has a stronger effect than the
33
Fig. 9. The inuences of Twwi on (a) Tcon,o, (b) Teva,o, (c) gmax, and (d) hth at Tcwi 5 C.
obtained numerically to evaluate the maximal objective parameter, gmax, with Tcwi 5 Ce8 C and Twwi 25 Ce28 C for
R134a, R152a, R245fa, R600a, and R717. The results obtained
support these conclusions:
34
2. Cold seawater temperature affects optimal condensing temperature more strongly than optimal evaporating temperature
in an OTEC system with an ORC. By contrast, warm seawater
temperature affects optimal evaporating temperature more
strongly than optimal condensing temperature.
3. The optimal temperature difference of seawater for obtaining
the maximal objective parameter for an OTEC system is affected
strongly by cold-seawater inlet temperature but weakly by
warm-seawater inlet temperature.
Acknowledgments
The nancial support for this research from the Engineering
Division of National Science Council, Republic of China, through
contract NSC 101-2221-E-022-004, is greatly appreciated.
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Glossary
At: total heat transfer area of heat exchangers (m2)
Ac: heat transfer area of condenser (m2)
Ae: heat transfer area of evaporator (m2)
D: diameter (m)
Dh: hydraulic diameter (m)
f: dimensionless friction factor
g: acceleration due to gravity, m/s2
h: heat transfer coefcient (W/m2- C)
i: enthalpy of working uid (kJ/kg)
k: thermal conductivity (W/m- C)
L: length of tube or pipe (m)
Lt: thickness of tube wall (m)
M: molecular weight of working uid (g/mole)
m: mass ow rate (kg/s)
p: pressure (kPa)
Pr: Prandtl number
Q: heat transfer rate (kW)
q: heat ux (W/m2)
Re: Reynolds number
T: temperature ( C)
Tcwi: cold seawater inlet temperature of heat exchanger ( C)
Twwi: warm seawater inlet temperature of heat exchanger ( C)
Twwo: warm seawater outlet temperature of heat exchanger ( C)
Tri: working uid inlet temperature of heat exchanger ( C)
Tro: working uid outlet temperature of heat exchanger ( C)
DT: temperature difference between inlet and outlet of heat exchanger ( C)
DTmean: logarithmic mean temperature difference of heat exchanger ( C)
DTw: the seawater temperature differences between inlet and outlet in heat
exchanger ( C)
U: overall heat transfer coefcient of heat exchanger (W/m2- C)
W: power of turbine or pump (W)
Greek symbols
g: ratio of Wnet to At
h: efciency
m: dynamic viscosity (Pa-s)
r: density (kg/m3)
n: kinematic viscosity (m2/s)
Subscripts
con: condensation, condenser
cw: cold seawater
eva: evaporation, evaporator
f: liquid
g: vapor
i: inside, inlet
max: maximal
net: net
o: outside, optimization
p: pump
r: working uid
t: tube, turbine
th: thermal
ver: verication
w: seawater
ww: warm seawater