Search

In this study, advanced exergy and exergoeconomic analysis are applied to an Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) for waste heat recovery to identify the potential for thermodynamic and economic improvement of the system (splitting the decision variables into avoidable/unavoidable parts) and the interdependencies between the components (endogenous and exogenous parts). For the first time, the advanced analysis has been applied under different conditions: constant heat rate supplied to the ORC or constant power generated by the ORC. The system simulation was performed in Matlab. The results show that the interactions among components of the ORC system are not strong; therefore, the approach of component-by-component optimization can be applied. The evaporator and condenser are important components to be improved from both thermodynamic and cost perspectives. The advanced exergoeconomic (graphical) optimization of these components indicates that the minimum temperature difference in the evaporator should be increased while the minimum temperature difference in the condenser should be decreased. The optimization results show that the exergetic efficiency of the ORC system can be improved from 27.1% to 27.7%, while the cost of generated electricity decreased from 18.14 USD/GJ to 18.09 USD/GJ. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, an Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) with three different working fluids (cyclohexane, benzene and toluene) is proposed for a cogeneration system used in cement industry. A parametric study is conducted to evaluate the effects of some key parameters on the system performance. The exergy, exergoeconomic and exergoenvironmental analyses of the ORC cycle with considered working fluids are carried out. The multi-objective optimization is performed to achieve the system optimal operating conditions. The optimization considers the exergy efficiency, the cost and the environmental impact per exergy unit of the net produced power as the objective functions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the performance of an organic Rankine cycle with a zeotropic mixture as a working fluid was evaluated using exergy-based methods: exergy, exergoeconomic, and exergoenvironmental analyses. The effect of system operation parameters and mixtures on the organic Rankine cycle's performance was evaluated as well. The considered performances were the following: exergy efficiency, specific cost, and specific environmental effect of the net power generation. A multi-objective optimization approach was applied for parametric optimization. The approach was based on the particle swarm algorithm to find a set of Pareto optimal solutions. One final optimal solution was selected using a decision-making method. The optimization results indicated that the zeotropic mixture of cyclohexane/toluene had a higher thermodynamic and economic performance, while the benzene/toluene zeotropic mixture had the highest environmental performance. Finally, a comparative analysis of zeotropic mixtures and pure fluids was conducted. The organic Rankine cycle with the mixtures as working fluids showed significant improvement in energetic, economic, and environmental performances. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]