Engine Load Effects on the Energy and Exergy Performance of a Medium Cycle/Organic Rankine Cycle for Exhaust Waste Heat Recovery.

The Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) has been proved a promising technique to exploit waste heat from Internal Combustion Engines (ICEs). Waste heat recovery systems have usually been designed based on engine rated working conditions, while engines often operate under part load conditions. Hence, it is quite important to analyze the off-design performance of ORC systems under different engine loads.

A new model based on adiabatic flame temperature for evaluation of the upper flammable limit of alkane-air-CO mixtures.

For security issue of alkane used in Organic Rankine Cycle, a new model to evaluate the upper flammability limits for mixtures of alkanes, carbon dioxide and air has been proposed in present study. The linear relationship was found at upper flammability limits between molar fraction of diluent in alkane-CO mixture and calculated adiabatic flame temperature. The prediction ability of the variable calculated adiabatic flame temperature model that incorporated the linear relationship above is greatly better than the models that adopted the fixed calculated adiabatic flame temperature at upper flammability limit.

A quantitative risk-assessment system (QR-AS) evaluating operation safety of Organic Rankine Cycle using flammable mixture working fluid.

Mixture of hydrocarbon and carbon dioxide shows excellent cycle performance in Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) used for engine waste heat recovery, but the unavoidable leakage in practical application is a threat for safety due to its flammability. In this work, a quantitative risk assessment system (QR-AS) is established aiming at providing a general method of risk assessment for flammable working fluid leakage. The QR-AS covers three main aspects: analysis of concentration distribution based on CFD simulations, explosive risk assessment based on the TNT equivalent method and risk mitigation based on evaluation results.

Flame temperature theory-based model for evaluation of the flammable zones of hydrocarbon-air-CO2 mixtures.

Theoretical models to evaluate the flammable zones of mixtures made up of hydrocarbon, carbon dioxide and air have been proposed in present study. A three-step reaction hypothesis for hydrocarbon combustion was introduced for predicting the upper flammability limit. The method to predict the parameters at fuel inertization point was put forward as well.