A Novel Gas Turbine Concept for Combined Power, Heat and Cooling Generation

An attractive and innovative technology for gas turbines for obtaining power, heat and cooling simultaneously has been developed and studied in Lund.The basic idea behind this technology, called the TRIGENERATION™, is to interrupt the expansion in the gas turbine expander at an elevated pressure level, at which the heat rejection is carried out in a heat exchanger. After that, the expansion of the flue gas continues until ambient pressure, but the temperature is below the ambient temperature. This “negative” temperature difference allows the use of the exhaust for cooling purposes. The performance coefficient, defined as the ratio between all the benefits (power, heat and cooling) and the fuel heat, can reach values higher than 100% (HHV). This technology has its major potential when integrated with “wet” cycles, e.g. HAT and STIG. In such cycles, an easier extraction of the latent heat of vaporization within the humid flue gas is allowed, due to the higher water dew point at higher pressures. In this work, this technology is evaluated through simulations in a heat and mass balance program for the simple cycle gas turbine.Copyright © 2001 by ASME