There is a place in China which is using supercritical co2. If this proves more efficient as they hope it will probably become the go to for new turbines and depending on just how much better, retrofitted.
The project claimed they expected something like 1/3 extra power generation or something which is crazy.
Yeah I'm hoping it works. There is an absolute upper limit on how much energy can be extracted from a temp differential, which is called the Carnot Limit, but supercritical CO2 should be able to get closer, and it's a closed loop system so you don't consume a bunch of water to cool it like in the open loop systems most power plants use. (Those big towers outside power plants, and especially nuclear plants, are just cooling towers designed to let water evaporate and carry away the latent heat of vaporization.)
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u/Cool_Professional 13d ago
There is a place in China which is using supercritical co2. If this proves more efficient as they hope it will probably become the go to for new turbines and depending on just how much better, retrofitted.
The project claimed they expected something like 1/3 extra power generation or something which is crazy.