Thermodynamic Cycle Processes

The growing global demand for energy and the use of fossil fuels are leading to an increase in the amount of carbon dioxide in the earth's atmosphere and a change in the climate, the effects of which are already being felt today in the form of extreme weather events. At the 2015 UN Climate Change Conference in Paris, the participating countries therefore agreed to limit global warming as far as possible to 1.5 K relative to the level before the start of industrialization. This requires a significant reduction in CO₂ emissions worldwide.

Thermodynamics plays an important role in research and development in energy and process engineering. With the first and second law, it provides the tools for balancing processes and thus for identifying optimization potentials. The focus is mainly on circular processes that serve to convert and thus utilize energy. These systems are ubiquitous - whether as refrigerators, heating systems or power plants. Without them, civilized life would be unimaginable.

In addition to the modeling or design of these cycle processes, experimental investigations of ORC, chiller and heat pump processes are carried out at the IfT, focusing on both the individual apparatuses and the working fluids used.

• Design and experimental investigation of an ORC plant for the conversion of waste heat into mechanical power
• Modeling and experimental analysis of different working fluids in the ORC cycle process
• Increasing the energy efficiency of an industrial refrigeration plant (Chiller)
• Model-based and experimental investigation of a compression heat pump with solution cycle for industrial use for the valorization of waste heat
• Development of plant control systems and control concepts
• Magnetocaloric heat pumps