System Optimization of Humid Air Turbine Cycle

Abstract

The humid air turbine (HAT) cycle, proposed by Mori et al. and recently developed by Rao et al. at Flour Daniel, has been identified as a promising way to generate electric power at high efficiency, low cost and simple system relative to combined cycle and steam injection gas turbine cycle. It has aroused considerable interest. Thermodynamic means, such as intercooling, regeneration, heat recovery at low temperature and especially non-isothermal vaporisation by multi-phase and multi-component, are adopted in HAT cycle to reduce the external and internal exergy losses relative to the energy conversion system. In addition to the parameter analysis and the technical aspect of HAT cycle, there is also a strong need for “systems” research to identify the best ways, of configuring HAT cycle to integrate all the thermodynamic advantages more efficiently to achieve high performance. The key units in HAT cycle are analyzed thermodynamically and modelled in this paper. The superstructure containing all potentially highly efficient flowsheeting alternatives is also proposed. The system optimization of the HAT cycle is thus represented by a nonlinear programming problem. The problem is solved automatically by a successive quadratic algorithm to select the optimal configuration and optimal design parameters for the HAT cycle. The results have shown that the configuration of the HAT cycle currently adopted is not optimal for efficiency and/or specific power, and the current pressure ratio are too high to be favorable for highest performance. Based on the current technical practice, the optimal flowsheeting for thermal efficiency can reach 60.33% when TIT=1533K, while the optimal flowsheeting for specific power can achieve 1300kW/kg/s air for TIT at 1533K. The optimal flowsheeting configuration is compared favorably with the other existing ones.