Project location: CanmetENERGY Ottawa.
Timeline: Ongoing
Program: Carbon Management Technologies
Project description
Our team aims to develop a system for the conversion of industrial waste heat to electrical power using liquid metal magnetohydrodynamic technology. This system applies two working fluids: a refrigerant, for the conversion of thermal to kinetic energy and liquid metal, for the conversion of kinetic to electrical energy.
A schematic of the low temperature magnetohydrodynamic power conversion system is presented in Figure 1. It consists of two vertical loops: a liquid metal loop on the left, and a refrigerant loop on the right. Heat is applied to either or both loops. The thermodynamic fluid is injected into the riser of the liquid metal loop, where it flows upward, expands, and induces natural circulation of liquid metal. Liquid metal kinetic energy is converted into electrical energy in the magnetohydrodynamic generator.
A photo of the gas lift liquid metal loop used in the system is presented in Figure 2. Research and development activities consist of component design and prototyping, multiphysics modeling of the magnetohydrodynamic generator, measurement and modeling of the liquid metal loop, performance evaluation of the energy conversion system, and liquid metal corrosion studies.
Figure 1: Schematic of the low temperature magnetohydrodynamics power conversion system.
