Waste Heat to Electricity Tesla Turbine Project

August 2004

This month we are going to take a look at a turbine we developed for a waste heat to electricity project at SVSU (Saginaw Valley State University).

According to a professor at SVSU, both EPA and certain local environmental groups are interested in reducing the ecological impact of industrial hot water discharge. Their studies have proven that elevated water temperatures at industrial discharge points have changed the ecology of Saginaw Bay to an extent that both plant & fish populations are completely out of balance.

Absolute proofs of this environmental/climate shift have led EPA to the conclusion that daily fines for these hot water polluters are now necessary.

In order to come into compliance with new regulations, industry must lower the temperature of its discharge to a reasonable level. Since cooling requires energy, this runs contrary to energy and industrial efficiency -- translating into high-cost products.

What if you were to utilize this waste heat to produce electricity? All would be rosy again. Heat would be extracted from the water, and positive electrical energy would more than compensate for the added process.

To make a long story short, we were approached by the SVSU project leader and asked to develop a custom turbine to operate on CFC refrigerant.

The reason for operating on CFC refrigerant is that a relatively high pressure gas can be produced from a relatively low temperature. In fact, we are working with a technical group in the state of Washington that is producing about 100 psi from about 190-210 degrees f. hot water.

Our part in the project was to simply develop the turbine component suitable for closed-loop gas operations. While the jury is still out on the results of their work, we should start getting some engineering numbers in on the project toward the end of this year (2004), or early next year.

When we designed this turbine, we utilized a few innovations, including:

Image Gallery

Click thumbnail images to view full size:

Next month we'll begin work on a newly engineered experimenter's turbine which should prove to be a hot item with club members...

Ken Rieli