Doubling the thermo-osmotic energy conversion efficiency through the reduction of heat and mass transfer resistance
Yifan Zhang,
Ji Li,
Zikang Zhang,
Yubo Tan,
Zhichun Liu and
Wei Liu
Applied Energy, 2025, vol. 389, issue C, No S0306261925004702
Abstract:
Enhancing efficiency is crucial to applying low-grade heat energy. Thermo-osmotic energy conversion (TOEC) system is a promising and efficient method to utilize low-grade heat. This study systematically investigates integrating high thermal conductivity network into the liquid chamber to decrease heat transfer resistance and examine the impact of water degassing on the transmembrane resistance. These measures notably boost the system's experimental and theoretical efficiencies, doubling them compared to similar systems. Furthermore, the experimental water flux of a single-stage TOEC system also reaches an attractive value of 56.69 L/m2/h. The theoretical model reveals that the 38-stage system attains a peak operational efficiency of 4.72 % and a corresponding power density of 34.05 W/m2 at heating and cooling temperatures of 80 °C and 40 °C, respectively. This study exhibits a feasible approach for enhancing the efficiency of TOEC system and improving the water yield of pressure-retarded membrane distillation systems.
Keywords: Thermo-osmosis; Low-grade heat; Heat transfer resistance; Efficiency; Pressure-retarded membrane distillation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:
Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0306261925004702
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.
Export reference: BibTeX
RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan)
HTML/Text
Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:appene:v:389:y:2025:i:c:s0306261925004702
Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/405891/bibliographic
http://www.elsevier. ... 405891/bibliographic
DOI: 10.1016/j.apenergy.2025.125740
Access Statistics for this article
Applied Energy is currently edited by J. Yan
More articles in Applied Energy from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().