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A Novel Thermal Regenerative Electrochemical System for Energy Recovery from Waste Heat

Waste-heat-to-power (WHP) recovers electrical power from exhaust heat emitted by industrial and commercial facilities. Waste heat is available in enormous quantities. The U.S. Department of Energy estimates 5-13 quadrillion BTUs/yr with a technical potential of 14.6 GW are available and could be utilized to generate power by converting the heat into electricity. The research proposed here will define a system that can economically recover energy from waste heat through a thermal regenerative electrochemical system. The primary motivation came from a patent and the research sponsored by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). The proposed system improves on this patent in four major ways: by using air/oxygen, rather than hydrogen; by eliminating the cross diffusion of counter ions and using a dual membrane cell design; and by using high concentrations of electrolytes that have boiling points below water. Therefore, this system also works at difficult-to-recover low temperatures. Electrochemical power is estimated at 0.2W/cm2, and for a 4.2 M solution at 1 L/s, the power of a 100 kW system is 425 kW. Distillation energy costs are simulated and found to be 504 kJ/s for a 1 kg/s feed stream. The conversion efficiency is then calculated at 84%. The Carnot efficiency for a conservative 50% conversion efficiency is compared to the ideal Carnot efficiency. Preliminary work suggests an LCOE of 0.6ยข/kWh. Industrial energy efficiency could be boosted by up to 10%. Potential markets include power stations, industrial plants, facilities at institutions like universities, geothermal conversion plants, and even thermal energy storage.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:unt.edu/info:ark/67531/metadc1808390
Date05 1900
CreatorsGray, David B
ContributorsChoi, Tae-Youl, Choi, Wongbong, Zhao, Weihuan
PublisherUniversity of North Texas
Source SetsUniversity of North Texas
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypeThesis or Dissertation
Formatvii, 54 pages, Text
RightsPublic, Gray, David B, Copyright, Copyright is held by the author, unless otherwise noted. All rights Reserved.

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