The dynamic behaviour of ORC-based power units fed by exhaust gases of internal combustion engines in mobile applications

Abstract

Exhaust gases Waste Heat Recovery (WHR) in Internal Combustion Engines (ICEs) performed through ORC-based Power Units (ORC-bPU) ensures a reduction of fuel consumption and consequently CO2 emissions. Nevertheless, high fluctuations of hot source push the ORC-bPU to work frequently in severe off-design conditions. Hence, a deep knowledge of the unit dynamic behaviour is fundamental to develop control and operating strategies allowing to achieve a successful recovery. Dynamic response assessment of ORC-bPUs has been treated in literature but making mainly reference to theoretical approaches or to variations of input variables without considering the matching to the engine and the necessary constraints which are present in a real mobile application. Moreover, Moving Boundary (MB) models are generally used as theoretical tools to support the dynamic analysis focusing the attention on Heat Recovery Vapor Generator (HRVG) which rules the plant dynamic response. In MB models, boundary conditions at the HRVG exit are mainly fixed by the expander and by the remaining circuit. To date, the attention was focused on the presence as expander of dynamic machines (turbine), deserving an evident lower attention to volumetric expanders nonetheless their higher suitability for low-medium scale ORC applications (few kWs). To fill these knowledge gaps, a novel approach is pursued in the present paper. The dynamic response of an ORC-bPU was experimentally observed for a step change of torque and revolution speed of an ICE directly connected to the recovery unit. The variation of engine operating conditions produced an unsteady variation of the temperature and flow rate of the exhaust gas feeding the unit. The dynamics of the engine and the connecting pipes is considered as well as all the typical constraints of a real situation. Results show HRVG and exhaust pipe ruling the dynamic behaviour of the unit, leading to long time constant and raising time of gas temperature of 150 s and 300 s respectively. These results show that the unit almost always works in transient conditions being engine torque and speed variations very fast. Nevertheless, thanks to the self-regulation capacity and the robustness of the scroll expander, the unit reacts in a satisfactory way. A further novelty of the present study concerns the integration of the widely used Moving Boundary (MB) approach with Permeability theory which considers the presence of a volumetric expander and all the ither downstream components, finding a match not available in literature between the HRVG and a volumetric expander and pump. The results of the new Permeability-Moving Boundary model (P-MB) was compared with those of a more comprehensive mathematical model. The comparisons show a comparable accuracy and a significantly lower computational time achieved with P-MB. Hence, P-MB could be implemented on board to set up control strategies enhancing the recovery tuned by a model-based approach.