Avoidable exergoenvironmental impact of organic rankine cycle waste heat recovery system of a marine power plant

Exergoenvironmental analysis is a combination of exergy analysis and life cycle analysis that could be used to evaluate and locate environmental impact of the energy systems as well as system components. Moreover, avoidable part of advanced exergoenvironmental analysis could be determined to show environmental friendly improvement potential of components and the overall system. In this paper, a superheated and a saturated vapor organic Rankine cycle as waste heat recovery system of a marine power plant have been investigated by employing conventional and advanced exergoenvironmental analyses. Results of component level conventional analyses provide the global effects of system and its components while avoidable impact results reveal further insight on options to reduce the exergy destruction and component based overall system environmental impact. Based on the analyses, comparisons are made and conclusions are drawn with suggestions for improving the waste heat recovery system.