Simulation Study of Heat Recovery System for a Turbofan with Intercooler and Recuperator

Abstract

Global warming has become a big problem in the present world. Greenhouse gas emissions such as carbon dioxide is contributing to global warming and the aviation sector alone has contributed a total of 49.4 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide emission in 2016. To reduce this harmful emission, the performance of the aircraft engine needs to be improved. In conjunction with this realization, having a heat recovery system using heat exchangers in the engine will not only help to improve the performance of the engine but also reduce the temperature of the exhaust gases that will be eliminated as waste heat into the atmosphere. The primary objective of introducing the intercoolers and recuperators is to reduce thrust specific fuel consumption while increasing thrust and reducing emissions. This research focuses on the analysis of intercooling and recuperation within the aspects of thermodynamics to be integrated into a typical turbofan engine. The analysis is conducted via a process simulation software – Aspen Plus V11. The goals of this study are to determine whether compression work will be reduced and studying the increase of engine performance with positioning of heat exchangers. Based on the analysis results, it has been shown that there is a reduction in compression work for the recuperated engine by 7.64% while there is a 13.73% increase in compression work for the intercooled engine. Furthermore, it is also found that the propulsive efficiency is increased in the recuperated cycle by 48.06% while it is reduced for the intercooled cycle by 32.03%.