Some Efficient Solutions to Recover Low and Medium Waste Heat: Competitiveness of the Thermoacoustic Technology

Overview & Synopsis

Climate change, the policy of the European Union (EU) by 2020 and the carbon-tax make the enhancement of the efficiency of existing processes and the reduction of the fuel consumption an urgent call for the industries. Since most of the wasted energy is discharged in form of hot gases with a low temperature, it makes recovery of this heat a very difficult task, and thus it is important to take a closer look on the existing technologies dedicated to recover low to medium waste heat. This paper details the pros and cons of the Rankine and complexes cycles try to expose a concrete example of each application and finally briefly introduces the potential of the thermoacoustic heat for recovering waste heat and generating electricity.