• New & Renewable Energy
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.31-40
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• 2020

Most countries in the world are trying to reduce the use of fossil fuels in the production of electricity and replace them with renewable energy technologies. In Korea, there are abundant ocean renewable energy sources that will play an important role in power generation in the future. This paper introduces a new tidal energy converter utilizing flow induced vibration (FIV), which can work efficiently, even in the currents slower than 1.0m/s. All tests were conducted at the Marine Renewable Energy Laboratory at the University of Michigan to examine the effects of the damping ratio of the electric generators on the power outputs and power efficiencies. In these tests, two identical circular cylinders were used, and passive turbulence controllers were applied to the surface of the cylinders to enhance the FIV. The experimental results showed that by using the two cylinders in the FIV, the power output and efficiency reached up to 31 W and 36%, respectively. In particular, the results showed that the power efficiency was higher at the relatively low flow speed (4

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.182-187
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• 2018

In this study, 20.8% of a p-type Si bifacial solar cell was used to develop a photovoltaic (PV) module to obtain the maximum power under a limited installation area. The transparent back sheet material was replaced during fabrication with a white one, which is opaque in commercial products. This is very beneficial for the generation of more electricity, owing to the additional power generation via absorption of light from the rear side. A new model is suggested herein to predict the power of the bifacial PV module by considering the backside reflections from the roof and/or environment. This model considers not only the frontside reflection, but also the nonuniformity of the backside light sources. Theoretical predictions were compared to experimental data to prove the validity of this model, the error range for which ranged from 0.32% to 8.49%. Especially, under $700W/m^2$, the error rate was as low as 2.25%. This work could provide theoretical and experimental bases for application to a distributed and microgrid network.

• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Electrical Engineers P
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• v.65 no.3
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• pp.165-170
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• 2016

Due to environmental issues such as global warming, the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions has become an inevitable measure to be taken. Among others, the building sector accounts for 50% of total carbon dioxide emissions, which is significantly high. Therefore, in order to reduce carbon dioxide emissions of the buildings, improving the energy efficiency by utilizing wind power among renewable energy sources is recommended. In case of buildings in the planning stage, it is possible to take the load of wind power generation systems into consideration when determining installed capacity. Already completed buildings, however, should be connected to small wind electric systems according to the live loads of the buildings based on the architectural design criteria. In order to connect to a building that has already been completed, it is necessary to consider the load of the small wind electric system as well as the live load of building. In addition, we need to generate the maximum electricity possible by determining the maximum installed capacity in a small area. In this paper, we propose the method for determining maximum capacity for building integrated small wind electric systems, which takes into account the considerations associated with connecting small wind electric systems to completed buildings. This can be developed into a system linked to solar power, which makes it possible to improve the energy independence of the building. In addition, carbon dioxide reduction by improving energy efficiency is expected.

• Environmental Engineering Research
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• v.23 no.3
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• pp.250-257
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• 2018

We developed new composites by combining the solid waste from Low-Density Polyethylene in the form of plastic bag (PB) and biomass from rice husk (RH),in the form of $(RH)_x(PB)_{1-x}$ (x = (1, 0.9, 0.7, 0.5)), as alternative fuels for electrical energy sources, and for providing the best solution to reduce environmental pollution. Elemental compositions were obtained by using proximate analysis, ultimate analysis, and X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy, and the thermal characteristics were obtained from thermogravimetric analysis. The compositions of carbon and hydrogen from the ultimate analysis show significant increases of 20-30% with increasing PB in the composite. The activation energy for RH is 101.22 kJ/mol; for x = 0.9 and 0.7, this increases by 4 and 6 magnitude, respectively, and for x = 0.5, shows remarkable increase to 165.30 kJ/mol. The range of temperature of about $480-660^{\circ}C$ is required for combustion of the composites $(RH)_x(PB)_{1-x}$ (x = (1, 0.9, 0.7, 0.5)) to perform the complete combustion process and produce high energy. In addition, the calorific value was determined by using bomb calorimetry, and shows value for RH of 13.44 MJ/kg, which increases about 30-40% with increasing PB content, indicating that PB has a strong effect of increasing the energy realized to generate electricity.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.52 no.1
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• pp.19-26
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• 2020

Small nuclear reactor features higher power capacity, longer operation life than conventional power sources. It could be an ideal alternative of existing power source applied for special equipment for terrestrial or underwater missions. In this paper, a 25kWe heat pipe cooled reactor power source applied for multiple use is preliminary designed. Based on the design, a thermal-hydraulic analysis code for heat pipe cooled reactor is developed to analyze steady and transient performance of the designed nuclear reactor. For reactor design, UN fuel with 65% enrichment and potassium heat pipes are adopted in the reactor core. Tungsten and LiH are adopted as radiation shield on both sides of the reactor core. The reactor is controlled by 6 control drums with B₄C neutron absorbers. Thermoelectric generator (TEG) converts fission heat into electricity. Cooling water removes waste heat out of the reactor. The thermal-hydraulic characteristics of heat pipes are simulated using thermal resistance network method. Thermal parameters of steady and transient conditions, such as the temperature distribution of every key components are obtained. Then the postulated reactor accidents for heat pipe cooled reactor, including power variation, single heat pipe failure and cooling channel blockage, are analyzed and evaluated. Results show that all the designed parameters satisfy the safety requirements. This work could provide reference to the design and application of the heat pipe cooled nuclear power source.

• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Power Electronics
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• v.17 no.6
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• pp.553-561
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• 2012

Existing energy sources convert chemical energy into mechanical energy, while fuel cell directly generates electricity through an electrochemical reaction between hydrogen and oxygen. Therefore, it has a lot of strong points such as high efficiency, zero emission, and etc. In addition, with the development of hydrogen preservation technique, some companies have been researching and releasing portable fuel cell power packs for specific applications like military equipment, automobile, and so on. However, there are some drawbacks to the fuel cell, high cost and slow dynamic response. In order to compensate these weak points, auxiliary energy storages could be applied to the fuel cell system. In this paper, the optimum structure for a 150W portable fuel cell power pack with a battery pack is selected considering the specification of the system, and the design process of main parts is described in detail. Here, main objectives are compact size, simple control, high efficiency, and low cost. Then, an automatic mode change algorithm, which converts the operating mode depending on the states of fuel cell stack, battery pack, and load, is introduced. Finally, performance of the designed prototype using the automatic mode change control is verified through experiments.

• Proceedings of the Materials Research Society of Korea Conference
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• 2012.05a
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• pp.58.2-58.2
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• 2012

Heavy hydrocarbon reforming is a core technology for "Dirty energy smart". Heavy hydrocarbons are components of fossil fuels, biomass, coke oven gas and etc. Heavy hydrocarbon reforming converts the fuels into $H_2$-rich syngas. And then $H_2$-rich syngas is used for the production of electricity, synthetic fuels and petrochemicals. Energy can be used efficiently and obtained from various sources by using $H_2$-rich syngas from heavy hydrocarbon reforming. Especially, the key point of "Dirty energy smart" is using "dirty fuel" which is wasted in an inefficient way. New energy conversion laboratory of KAIST has been researched diesel reforming for solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) as a part of "Dirty energy smart". Diesel is heavy hydrocarbon fuels which has higher carbon number than natural gas, kerosene and gasoline. Diesel reforming has difficulties due to the evaporation of fuels and coke formation. Nevertheless, diesel reforming technology is directly applied to "Dirty fuel" because diesel has the similar chemical properties with "Dirty fuel". On the other hand, SOFC has advantages on high efficiency and wasted heat recovery. Nippon oil Co. of Japan recently commercializes 700We class SOFC system using city gas. Considering the market situation, the development of diesel reformer has a great ripple effect. SOFC system can be applied to auxiliary power unit and distributed power generation. In addition, "Dirty energy smart" can be realized by applying diesel reforming technology to "Dirty fuel". As well as material developments, multidirectional approaches are required to reform heavy hydrocarbon fuels and use $H_2$-rich gas in SOFC. Gd doped ceria (CGO, $Ce_{1-x}Gd_xO_{2-y}$) has been researched for not only electrolyte materials but also catalysts supports. In addition, catalysts infiltrated electrode over porous $La_{0.8}Sr_{0.2}Ga_{0.8}Mg_{0.2}O_3-{\delta}$ and catalyst deposition at three phase boundary are being investigated to improve the performance of SOFC. On the other hand, nozzle for diesel atomization and post-reforming for light-hydrocarbons removal are examples of solving material problems in multidirectional approaches. Likewise, multidirectional approaches are necessary to realize "Dirty energy smart" like reforming "Dirty fuel" for SOFC.

• Journal of IKEEE
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.355-363
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• 2022

Korea is pursuing a plan to switch and expand energy sources with a focus on renewable energy with the goal of becoming carbon neutral by 2050. As the instability of energy supply increases due to the intermittent nature of renewable energy, accurate prediction of the amount of renewable energy generation is becoming more important. Therefore, the government has opened a small-scale power brokerage market and is implementing a system that pays settlements according to the accuracy of renewable energy prediction. In this paper, a prediction model was implemented using a statistical model and an artificial intelligence model for the prediction of solar power generation. In addition, the results of prediction accuracy were compared and analyzed, and the revenue from the settlement amount of the renewable energy generation forecasting system was estimated.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Navigation and Port Research Conference
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• 2021.11a
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• pp.132-133
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• 2021

In recent years, energy harvesting from natural sources and waste heat has been attracting more attention from researchers in response to ever-growing energy demands, high energy prices, and climate-change-mitigation purposes. It is also an important step towards future sustainable energy usages. In thermal dynamic cycles, expanders are playing as the most important equipment for waste heat recovery and energy harvesting as well. As a kind of expander, the bladeless turbine has a promising future and more widely using owning its advantages on relatively long life, good off-design performance, easy operation cleaning and maintenance, a simple structure, no blade corrosion, and low manufacturing costs. There are numerous studies about using the Tesla Turbine as a key technology for energy harvesting in a wide range of applications and conditions. They are presented to help identify technologies that have sufficient potential for applicating to our life and marine industrial engineering. This review paper, initially, presents an overview of current studies both theoretical and experimental of Tesla Turbine usage for waste heat recovery alongside its challenges and investigation on the effect of its configuration, working fluid selection as well. To conclude, future perspectives besides possible ways of transforming waste heat energy to electricity or work, which leads to circular energy, are discussed. The ambition of this paper is to act as a first-hand reference, through the well-defined possible directions, to the young researchers and senior scientists.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2010.06a
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• pp.237.1-237.1
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• 2010

Recent developments such as concern over global warming, depletion of fossil fuels and increase in energy demands by the increasing world population has eventually lead to mass production of electricity using renewable sources. Ocean contains energy in form of thermal energy and mechanical energy: thermal energy from solar radiation and mechanical energy from the waves and tides. The current paper looks at generating power using waves. The primary objective of the present study is to maximize the primary energy conversion (first stage conversion) of the base model by making some design changes. The model entire consisted of a numerical wave tank and the turbine section. The turbine section had three components; front guide nozzle, augmentation channel and the rear chamber. The augmentation channel further consisted of a front nozzle, rear nozzle and an internal fluid region representing the turbine housing. Different front guide nozzle configuration and rear chamber design were studied. As mentioned, a numerical wave tank was utilized to generate waves of desired properties and later the turbine section was integrated. The waves in the numerical wave tank were generated by a piston type wave maker which was located at the wave tank inlet. The inlet which was modeled as a plate wall which moved sinusoidally with the general function, $x=asin{\omega}t$. In addition to primary energy conversion, observation of flow characteristics, pressure and the velocity in the augmentation channel, rear chamber as well as the front guide nozzle are presented in the paper. The analysis was performed using the commercial code of the ANSYS-CFX. The base model recorded water power of 29.9 W. After making the changes, the best model obtained water power of 37.1 W which represents an increase of approximately 24% in water power and primary energy conversion.