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Carnot 4

The reversed Carnot cycle is a reversible thermodynamic cycle that can function as a heat pump or refrigeration cycle by reversing the direction of heat and work interactions. Carnot's theorem states that no engine operating between two heat reservoirs can exceed the efficiency of a Carnot engine, highlighting the importance of temperature differences in determining maximum efficiency. Real heat engines are less efficient than the ideal Carnot cycle due to irreversibilities and energy losses, but the Carnot efficiency equation remains a useful benchmark for estimating potential performance.

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4 views2 pages

Carnot 4

The reversed Carnot cycle is a reversible thermodynamic cycle that can function as a heat pump or refrigeration cycle by reversing the direction of heat and work interactions. Carnot's theorem states that no engine operating between two heat reservoirs can exceed the efficiency of a Carnot engine, highlighting the importance of temperature differences in determining maximum efficiency. Real heat engines are less efficient than the ideal Carnot cycle due to irreversibilities and energy losses, but the Carnot efficiency equation remains a useful benchmark for estimating potential performance.

Uploaded by

Irshad Ahmad
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Reversed Carnot cycle

[edit]
A Carnot heat-engine cycle described is a totally reversible cycle. That is, all the processes that compose it can be reversed, in which case it becomes the
Carnot heat pump and refrigeration cycle. This time, the cycle remains exactly the same except that the directions of any heat and work interactions are reversed.
Heat is absorbed from the low-temperature reservoir, heat is rejected to a high-temperature reservoir, and a work input is required to accomplish all this. The P–
V diagram of the reversed Carnot cycle is the same as for the Carnot heat-engine cycle except that the directions of the processes are reversed. [3]

Carnot's theorem
[edit]
Main article: Carnot's theorem (thermodynamics)

It can be seen from the above diagram that for any cycle operating between temperatures and , none can exceed the efficiency of a
Carnot cycle.

Figure 6: A real
engine (left) compared to the Carnot cycle (right). The entropy of a real material changes with
temperature. This change is indicated by the curve on a T–S diagram. For this figure, the curve
indicates a vapor-liquid equilibrium (See Rankine cycle). Irreversible systems and losses of
energy (for example, work due to friction and heat losses) prevent the ideal from taking place at
every step.
Carnot's theorem is a formal statement of this fact: No engine operating between two heat reservoirs can be more efficient than a Carnot engine operating
between those same reservoirs. Thus, Equation 3 gives the maximum efficiency possible for any engine using the corresponding temperatures. A corollary to
Carnot's theorem states that: All reversible engines operating between the same heat reservoirs are equally efficient. Rearranging the right side of the equation
gives what may be a more easily understood form of the equation, namely that the theoretical maximum efficiency of a heat engine equals the difference in
temperature between the hot and cold reservoir divided by the absolute temperature of the hot reservoir. Looking at this formula an interesting fact becomes
apparent: Lowering the temperature of the cold reservoir will have more effect on the ceiling efficiency of a heat engine than raising the temperature of the hot
reservoir by the same amount. In the real world, this may be difficult to achieve since the cold reservoir is often an existing ambient temperature.

In other words, the maximum efficiency is achieved if and only if entropy does not change per cycle. An entropy change per cycle is made, for example, if there
is friction leading to dissipation of work into heat. In that case, the cycle is not reversible and the Clausius theorem becomes an inequality rather than an equality.
Otherwise, since entropy is a state function, the required dumping of heat into the environment to dispose of excess entropy leads to a (minimal) reduction in
efficiency. So Equation 3 gives the efficiency of any reversible heat engine.

In mesoscopic heat engines, work per cycle of operation in general fluctuates due to thermal noise. If the cycle is performed quasi-statically, the fluctuations vanish
even on the mesoscale.[4] However, if the cycle is performed faster than the relaxation time of the working medium, the fluctuations of work are inevitable.
Nevertheless, when work and heat fluctuations are counted, an exact equality relates the exponential average of work performed by any heat engine to the heat
transfer from the hotter heat bath.[5]

Efficiency of real heat engines


[edit]
See also: Heat Engine § Efficiency

Carnot realized that, in reality, it is not possible to build a thermodynamically reversible engine. So, real heat engines are even less efficient than indicated by
Equation 3. In addition, real engines that operate along the Carnot cycle style (isothermal expansion / isentropic expansion / isothermal compression / isentropic
compression) are rare. Nevertheless, Equation 3 is extremely useful for determining the maximum efficiency that could ever be expected for a given set of thermal
reservoirs.
Although Carnot's cycle is an idealization, Equation 3 as the expression of the Carnot efficiency is still useful. Consider the average temperatures,

from the system. Then, replace TH and TC in Equation 3 by ⟨TH⟩ and ⟨TC⟩, respectively, to estimate the efficiency a heat engine.
at which the first integral is over a part of a cycle where heat goes into the system and the second integral is over a cycle part where heat goes out

For the Carnot cycle, or its equivalent, the average value ⟨TH⟩ will equal the highest temperature available, namely TH, and ⟨TC⟩ the lowest, namely TC. For other
less efficient thermodynamic cycles, ⟨TH⟩ will be lower than TH, and ⟨TC⟩ will be higher than TC. This can help illustrate, for example, why a reheater or
a regenerator can improve the thermal efficiency of steam power plants and why the thermal efficiency of combined-cycle power plants (which incorporate gas
turbines operating at even higher temperatures) exceeds that of conventional steam plants. The first prototype of the diesel engine was based on the principles of
the Carnot cycle.

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