[Geezer]

Even with the relatively low efficiency ratings of many generators, I'm surprised that nobody is combining an air/air heat pump with a very efficient thermal-electric generator.  Or, perhaps using air as a heat source in the summer, and water/earth as a heat source in the winter.

You will notice I "proposed" something like that earlier in this thread.

It won't work. The thermal efficiency is limited (per Carnot) by the temperature difference between the hot and cold sinks. If you use air/water or something similar, the difference (in absolute temperature terms) is very small, so there is almost no "headroom" to cover the losses in the mechanism.

If you try to use a heatpump to boost the temperature difference, the heatpump will consume more power than the heat engine can produce, so that's not going to help.

You can model any ideas you have using tools you will find here  http://www.thermofluids.net/

[yor_on]

These guys seem to think it can http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/06/22/new-multiferroic-alloy-creates-electricity-from-waste-heat/

That will be very cool with laptops.
=

Or maybe not, 'strongly magnetic' may foil its benefits?

[CliffordK]

Even with the relatively low efficiency ratings of many generators, I'm surprised that nobody is combining an air/air heat pump with a very efficient thermal-electric generator.  Or, perhaps using air as a heat source in the summer, and water/earth as a heat source in the winter.

You will notice I "proposed" something like that earlier in this thread.

It won't work. The thermal efficiency is limited (per Carnot) by the temperature difference between the hot and cold sinks. If you use air/water or something similar, the difference (in absolute temperature terms) is very small, so there is almost no "headroom" to cover the losses in the mechanism.

I'm still trying to wrap my head around this one. 

Earlier, I think you said that an electric resistance heater is 100% efficient.
But, a heatpump is "better"...  so in effect it should be better than 100%.

The classic Heat Pump isn't amplifying a temperature difference like the Stirling Engine.  Rather, it's heating and cooling coils are independent.  In fact, one wants the heating or cooling coils to be as close to the desired temperature as possible. 

Anyway, if one was to use an ideal gas to heat another ideal gas...
PV=nRT.

Then one ends up with a dog chasing it's tail.  Transferring energy from one state to another.

Perhaps the trick is that by using liquid/gas transitions, one can improve over the energy efficiency that would otherwise be predicted by the ideal gas law.

So...  say you have two gases.

Gas A & Gas B.
Applying 60 PSI (2 ATM)
If you increase the energy density of Gas A by 10 fold (vapor pressure/liquifying), and Gas B by 3 fold (ideal gas law)

Then you have suddenly created an energy difference between the two states.  In fact, we use this gas/liquid phase change a lot.  Every steam engine (including those in modern Nuclear Plants) utilizes it.

So, choosing the right gas/liquid phase change, one should be able to amplify this potential energy change, using a minimum energy input.

Hmmm.
Ok, so this is why at moderate temperatures/pressures, Freon is much more efficient than Nitrogen (or Helium) for refrigeration.  Both would technically work, but the Freon is much more compressible by pushing it through the phase change.

One would need to efficiently further amplify the energy, perhaps by using multiple stages.  Or, find a better way to generate electricity from the captured energy.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ok...  how about this hypothetical engine.

Take Gaseous Freon, say at 20°C.
Pressurize it to liquify it.  Say raise the temperature to above the BP of Methanol (65°C).  Say up to the temperature of 80°C.

At this point, your methanol should boil, and could be used to generate power.  Until your freon drops down to close to the BP of Methanol. (65°C).

Now, you can use the ambient temperature (20°C) to cool the Methanol back to the liquid phase (FREE ENERGY). 

Your Freon, now at 65°C should still boil.  And, could be used to generate pressure/power too.  It will be a slightly lower pressure than when it was at 80°C. 

When the Freon boils, it will drop down to... say 0°C.  Depending on your gas, it could be a lot lower, but it really all depends on your pressures & potentially the starting temperature (which we said was 65°C).

You use the ambient temperature to raise the temperature of the Freon gas back up to the ambient temperature (20°C), (FREE ENERGY) and repeat the process.

So...  In this system, you have:
Energy Gain (Boiling Methanol)
Energy Loss (loss of Vapor Pressure of Freon with drop in temperature from 80°C to 65°C).

So, the question is whether this hypothetical energy loss and gain would be equal, or if it would be different.

One is both heating and cooling with ambient temperatures...  but, presumably one could have a net change, or cooling of the ambient temperature which would reflect the energy captured. 

Your "Energy" is that, say, 20°C is equal to 293°K, which is an energetic state.

Obviously you would have to take a lot of care to make the entire system as efficient as possible.

If you could have 90+% energy conversion, my guess is that you could design such a system that would actually give you a net energy gain.  However, with the typical less than 50% energy conversion, it would be a lot more difficult to do.

I suppose I will have to get some real numbers with actual temperatures and vapor pressures to prove that. 

If one looks at this vapor pressure chart from Wikipedia.


This is on a logarithmic scale.
But, each substance also has a slightly different curve.

Maybe I'm thinking about this all backwards.

Looking at this chart...
Say from 10°C to 40°C
The Vapor Pressure of Methyl Chloride increases from 3.5 ATM to 8.5 ATM (5 ATM difference).
The Vapor Pressure of Diethyl Ether increases from 0.4 ATM to 1.5 ATM (about 1ATM difference).

I think you could utilize that difference, but you would probably use low pressure and substances with higher boiling points for the refrigerant.   

[Geezer]

Earlier, I think you said that an electric resistance heater is 100% efficient.

Yes - in terms of the heat it produces, it is 100% efficient in converting electrical energy into thermal energy.

But, a heatpump is "better"...  so in effect it should be better than 100%.

Yes - it's better because the electrical energy is converted into work by a motor and the work done by the motor removes thermal energy from one source of heat and delivers it to sink at a higher temperature. The important bit here is that work was done. The motor is not 100% efficient, but it can still transfer a lot of heat by doing work. Essentially the heat pump is "squeezing" the heat out of some ambient heat source. (The heat generated because of the inefficiency of the motor should end up in the heat supplied, so none of the electrical energy goes to waste in the heating case.)

The heat pump only works because there is a source of thermal energy. If the house was surrounded by space at 0K (zero kelvin) the heat pump could not supply heat, but the resistor could.

"Efficiencies" are very trixy things. Unless the conditions are very carefully defined it's possible to make some remarkable claims.

In this case, as resistive heating is 100% efficient (and it really is) heat pump heating systems can be much more than 100% efficient, which is obviously ridiculous!

The reality is that a resistor is 100% efficient at producing heat from electricity, but it is 0% efficient at pumping heat using electricity.

(I'll try to respond to the rest of your post as time allows.)

[CliffordK]

You can calculate the efficiency of an electric motor and electric generator quite easily.

Connect the motor to the generator.
Measure the power in, and the power out, and calculate the efficiency.

One can do something similar with a solar-electric panel.
Use electricity to produce light to shine on a solar panel, and calculate the output.
However, the efficiency of the solar panels is generally quite low.

Unfortunately, one doesn't have a direct generator from a heat source, although that was what started this topic.

However...
One has basic unit conversions...
And can calculate...  1 calorie of energy can heat up 1cc of water 1°C.  Or, whatever your favorite units are.  Anyway, 4.18 Watt Seconds = 1 calorie, heats 1cc of water 1°C.

So, you feed into your resistance heater, 4.18 Watt Seconds, and it should raise 1cc of water 1°C.

If you could recover the energy back from that resistance heater, you should be able to recover 4.18 Watt Seconds for that 1cc of water, 1°C.

Now, if you feed it into the heat pump, and that same 4.18 Watt Seconds raises 1cc of water 5°C, or 5cc of water 1°C.  Then you have a problem.

And, you should be able to put that 4.18 Watt Seconds of power in, and recover 20.9 Watt Seconds back out.

Obviously, you are recovering energy from a secondary source, the sun through its heating of your heat exchange medium, the air, water, whatever.

Unfortunately we are still stuck if our conversion efficiency from heat to electricity is still less than 50%.  But, even at 50%, we might be able to get somewhat of a net gain.

[Geezer]

Unfortunately we are still stuck if our conversion efficiency from heat to electricity is still less than 50%.  But, even at 50%, we might be able to get somewhat of a net gain.

I'm not sure about the idea that conversion of heat to electricity has to be less than 50%. That is not dictated by Thermodynamics.

Isothermal conversion of heat to work is reversible, and adiabatic energy conservation is common. If it was not, the dampers on your car's suspension would not work very well.

Anyway, do you agree with my explanation of the difference between a resistor and a heat pump?

[CliffordK]

Anyway, do you agree with my explanation of the difference between a resistor and a heat pump?

We agree on how a heatpump operates.

Theoretically, one could have super-efficient energy conversions, solar, heat, or chemical to electricity.  There are some practical problems in the implementation which leads to significant differences between the calculated energy input and the actual energy output of the various systems.

[Geezer]

Theoretically, one could have super-efficient energy conversions, solar, heat, or chemical to electricity.  There are some practical problems in the implementation which leads to significant differences between the calculated energy input and the actual energy output of the various systems.

Theoretically you can't.     These are not practical problems. Physics dictates the limits.

A heat engine (and a heat pump is just a heat engine) operates on the basis of moving thermal energy from one place to another place to do work or, in the case of the pump, doing work to move thermal energy from one place to another place.

Unfortunately, heat only travels "downhill" (from a hot thing to a cooler thing) and every time that happens, the Universe applies an inescapable tax in the form of entropy. So, even if a heat pump was perfect (no losses at all), it could never get back all the work put in when operating in reverse.

The only way to avoid the "tax" is to keep everything at the same temperature, but heat engines only operate because of temperature difference. It's just not fair!

[Geezer]

So...  say you have two gases.

Gas A & Gas B.
Applying 60 PSI (2 ATM)
If you increase the energy density of Gas A by 10 fold (vapor pressure/liquifying), and Gas B by 3 fold (ideal gas law)

Then you have suddenly created an energy difference between the two states.  In fact, we use this gas/liquid phase change a lot.  Every steam engine (including those in modern Nuclear Plants) utilizes it.

So, choosing the right gas/liquid phase change, one should be able to amplify this potential energy change, using a minimum energy input.

Hmmm.
Ok, so this is why at moderate temperatures/pressures, Freon is much more efficient than Nitrogen (or Helium) for refrigeration.  Both would technically work, but the Freon is much more compressible by pushing it through the phase change.

One would need to efficiently further amplify the energy, perhaps by using multiple stages.  Or, find a better way to generate electricity from the captured energy.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ok...  how about this hypothetical engine.

Take Gaseous Freon, say at 20°C.
Pressurize it to liquify it.  Say raise the temperature to above the BP of Methanol (65°C).  Say up to the temperature of 80°C.

At this point, your methanol should boil, and could be used to generate power.  Until your freon drops down to close to the BP of Methanol. (65°C).

Now, you can use the ambient temperature (20°C) to cool the Methanol back to the liquid phase (FREE ENERGY). 

Your Freon, now at 65°C should still boil.  And, could be used to generate pressure/power too.  It will be a slightly lower pressure than when it was at 80°C. 

When the Freon boils, it will drop down to... say 0°C.  Depending on your gas, it could be a lot lower, but it really all depends on your pressures & potentially the starting temperature (which we said was 65°C).

You use the ambient temperature to raise the temperature of the Freon gas back up to the ambient temperature (20°C), (FREE ENERGY) and repeat the process.

So...  In this system, you have:
Energy Gain (Boiling Methanol)
Energy Loss (loss of Vapor Pressure of Freon with drop in temperature from 80°C to 65°C).

So, the question is whether this hypothetical energy loss and gain would be equal, or if it would be different.

One is both heating and cooling with ambient temperatures...  but, presumably one could have a net change, or cooling of the ambient temperature which would reflect the energy captured. 

Your "Energy" is that, say, 20°C is equal to 293°K, which is an energetic state.

Obviously you would have to take a lot of care to make the entire system as efficient as possible.

If you could have 90+% energy conversion, my guess is that you could design such a system that would actually give you a net energy gain.  However, with the typical less than 50% energy conversion, it would be a lot more difficult to do.

I suppose I will have to get some real numbers with actual temperatures and vapor pressures to prove that. 

If one looks at this vapor pressure chart from Wikipedia.


This is on a logarithmic scale.
But, each substance also has a slightly different curve.

Maybe I'm thinking about this all backwards.

Looking at this chart...
Say from 10°C to 40°C
The Vapor Pressure of Methyl Chloride increases from 3.5 ATM to 8.5 ATM (5 ATM difference).
The Vapor Pressure of Diethyl Ether increases from 0.4 ATM to 1.5 ATM (about 1ATM difference).

I think you could utilize that difference, but you would probably use low pressure and substances with higher boiling points for the refrigerant.   

I did take another look. I think you should try that tool I mentioned. It will let you model any of these configurations and let you know how much work each will do.
 
However, a couple of points.
 
There is no particular thermal benefit in using a phase change fluid in a heat engine to do work. The phase change takes in a large amount of heat without any great benefit because you have to give the heat up again to get the fluid to condense. You can skip the liquid/gas phase changes and heat the gas instead.
 
However, you also have to repressurise the fluid to get it to do work, but compressing a gas consumes a large amount of work. If you condense the fluid back into a liquid it takes hardly any work to compress it to the desired working pressure of the expansion device.

[widereader]

Heat from hot springs can definitely be turned to electricity. 

[ns8t]

this week i purchased a mercury free thermostat for forced air furnace.  Inside is a coiled very thin ribbon of metal, i think two seperate metals fused together, so that the tension created from different thermal expansion and contraction creates movement that triggers a microswitch.  I would think that thousands of these ribbons of metal could turn a dynamo when temperature increased or decreased even a few degrees.

[CliffordK]

A mercury thermostat works in essentially the same fashion, except that it uses Mercury for the switch. 

Thermal Expansion/Contraction could be very powerful.  It doesn't require a bimetallic structure, and could be used with either liquids or metals.  However, it does require the material to absorb the Energy related to the temperature change to cause the work to be performed, with the thicker the component, the more heat to be absorbed/dissipated.

One could imagine a generator designed to cycle on a diurnal cycle.

Piezoelectric may be a similar concept.

[syhprum]

When the London Festival Hall was built we were told that it would have a heat pump system using redundent Merlin aircraft engines.
Was this bizarre system ever built and how long did it last ?.

[imatfaal]

Very old news clipping

Cannot find anything else on the web

[CliffordK]

Very old news clipping
Cannot find anything else on the web

Interesting.
So, they used Natural Gas to run engines to run the heat pump.
And used the exhaust from the NG engines for heating. 

So, say one wished to use Natural Gas to heat their home.  Rather than just burning the gas, one can burn the gas to power an engine to do work...  AND use the heat generated from burning the Natural Gas.

I know that many furnaces in the Midwest are already connected to an AC system.  It probably wouldn't take much to merge the two technologies, and perhaps double the efficiency of the system. 

I suppose the biggest problem is finding a good source of "exchange heat" when it is 5°F (-13°C) outside.

And, of course, NOISE as well as additional system complexity.  Ok, so perhaps this is best kept to larger commercial systems.

Ahhh...
I thought I'd look to see what our local university is doing with their steam plant.
Apparently they are upgrading to add turbines to generate electricity with the energy before heating water.
http://sustainability.uoregon.edu/office-sustainability/news/uo-upgrade-campus-utilities

Of course, I guess London was doing that a half century ago.

[syhprum]

Many thanks for finding that I wondered if my memory was playing tricks, I don't think natural gas was "invented" in 1951 they would have used the rather lethal stuff made from coal.
I don't think the system lasted long the Merlins made much to much noise to be used in a concert hall installation and even much detuned they would have needed a great deal off maintenance. 

[CliffordK]

Many thanks for finding that I wondered if my memory was playing tricks, I don't think natural gas was "invented" in 1951 they would have used the rather lethal stuff made from coal.. 

Interesting.  There is a good article on Wikipedia about Coal Gas.

The use of Natural Gas in the USA began in the 40's and 50's, but came later in the UK, with the changeover occurring in the UK from 1959 to 1987.

Apparently the composition of the coal gas varied somewhat, but was primarily:
    hydrogen 50%
    methane 35%
    carbon monoxide 10%
    ethylene 5%

With the "lethal" part being carbon monoxide, which would be burnt to a large extent in the stoves, and should be burnt, or go up the chimney in properly vented furnaces.

I've read about carbon monoxide poisoning in the past in the UK.  Apparently a disturbing large portion are actually caused by electric appliances causing slow smoldering fires.