Second Law Analysis of Evaporator for Organic Rankine Cycle System

The evaporator is a key component for Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) system. Second law analysis of the evaporator was carried out in this work. Three processes were included and studied: pre-heating, boiling and super-heating. Firstly, ε–NTU method was applied to study the heat transfer area of evaporator. Then, internal entropy generation for three processes of evaporator was studied by entropy generation number. Thirdly, entropy generation distribution (ds/dA) was predicted by analyzing the temperature difference between the two sides of single stage counter-flow evaporator, for both pure and mixed working fluids. The results show that increase of waste heat fluid temperature increases internal irreversibility, and higher evaporator pressure decreases this irreversibility. The results also show that temperature difference at the end part of boiling process is larger for pure working fluids; and for mixed fluids, because of its’ increasing boiling temperature, this irreversibility decreases remarkably. In conclusion, second law analysis shows that the evaporating pressure plays a key role in evaporator design for ORC system; and both evaporator and working fluid should be well designed to minimize the second law loss.