• 유체기계공업학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2006.08a
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• pp.157-160
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• 2006

A turbo-expander is developed for the regeneration in the expansion process. The turbo-expander operates in the partial admission and supersonic flow, and an axial-type single stage turbine is applied to the turbo-expander. Its outer diameter is 82mm and the operating gas is R134a. A 15kW reciprocating compressor is applied in this experiment and the turbo-expander is installed in the expansion process instead of the commonly using expansion valve. Two supersonic nozzles are applied for the expansion process. The high speed of R 134a after passing the supersonic nozzles gives the impulse force to the turbo-expander and some powers are generated on this process. A generator is installed at the end of the turbo-expander shaft. The generating output power from the turbo-expander is controlled by the power controller. Pressures and temperatures are measured on the lines for the performance investigation. More than 600W/(kg/sec) are generated in this experiment.

• Tribology and Lubricants
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• v.21 no.3
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• pp.114-121
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• 2005

As fuel cell system is environmental friendly generator, its performance depends on its air supply system. Because, fuel cell stack generates electrical energy by electron and the electron is generated by reacting between air and hydrogen. So, more and more compressed air is supplied, more and more the energy can be obtained. In this study, turbo-expander supported by air foil bearing is introduced as the air supply system used by fuel cell systems. The turbo-expander is a turbo machine which operates at high speed, so air foil bearings suit its purpose for the bearing elements. Analysis for confirming the stability and endurance is conducted. Based on FDM and Newton-Raphson method, characteristics of air foil bearing, dynamic coefficients, pressure field and load capacity, are obtained. Using the characteristics of air foil bearing, the rotordynamic analysis is performed by finite element method. The analysis (stability analysis and critical speed map) shows that turbo-expander is stability at running speed. After the analysis, the test process and results are presented. The goals of test are running up to 90,000 RPM, flow rate of 150 $m^3/h$ and pressure ratio of 1.15. The test results show that the aerodynamic performance and stability of turbo-expander are satisfied to the primary goals.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.19 no.6
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• pp.72-79
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• 2015

Electricity can be generated when the natural gas passes through a turbo-expander pressure reduction system at natural gas pressure reduction stations. Efficiency of the turbo-expander depends on the ratio of the natural gas flow rates to the design flow rate of the turbo-expander. Therefore, the optimal conditions for the operation of the pressure reduction system can be determined by controlling the natural gas flow rates. In this study, we have calculated the electric energy generation depending on the natural gas flow rates at the two low-pressure reduction stations when the pressure of the natural gas is reduced from 17.5 bar to 8.5 bar and have found the optimal conditions for the turbo-expander pressure reduction system through the comparison with the calculation results. The turbo-expander generates the electric power efficiently for the high natural gas flow rates which variations are slight. The determined design flow rate of the turbo-expander has the highest coverage of the natural gas flow rates. The electricity generation is calculated as much as 9 MW(B station) and 12 MW(D station) at each pressure reduction station.

• Progress in Superconductivity and Cryogenics
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.41-46
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• 2015

Recently, the development of the HTS power cable is actively promoted. As the length of HTS power cable increases, there have been many efforts to develop large capacity cryocooler. Among the various cryocooler, the Brayton refrigerator is the most competitive for HTS power cable. The Brayton refrigerator is composed of recuperative heat exchangers, a compressor, and a cryogenic turbo expander. In these components, the cryogenic turbo expander is a part to decrease the temperature and it is the most significant component that is closely related with overall system efficiency. It rotates with high speed using a high-pressure helium or neon gas at cryogenic temperature. This paper describes the design of a 10 kW class Brayton refrigeration cycle and the cryogenic turbo expander. Flow and structural analysis are performed for the rotating impeller and nozzle to verify the efficiency and the design performance.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.74-81
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• 2019

Expansion turbine system to recover the electricity energy from natural gas transmission stations is a well-known technique. The turbo-expander efficiency depends on the ratio of the natural gas flow rates to the design flow rate of the turbo-expander. However, if there is a big difference of the natural gas flow rate through the pressure letdown station because of seasonal supply pattern, that is, high flow rate in winter while low flow rate in summer, single turbo-expander system is not so efficient as to recover the pressurized energy from the low flow-rate natural gas. Therefore, we have proposed a new concept of double turbo-expander system: one is a big capacity and the other a small capacity. Here we have theoretically computed the electric powers at the pressure reduction from 18.5 bar to 7.5 bar depending on the inlet conditions of temperature and flow rate. The calculated electricity generation has been increased by 30% from 12.4 MW in a single turbo expander to 16.1 MW in the proposed double turbo-expander system when a minimal design efficiency of 0.72 is applied.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Manufacturing Process Engineers
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• v.15 no.6
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• pp.129-135
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• 2016

There have been many types of development and commercialization efforts for superconducting power applications with the continuous development of High Temperature Superconducting (HTS) conductors. In particular, HTS power cables are going to be commercialized in real power grids. A cryogenic refrigeration system should be used to keep it below 77 K, and its required cooling capacity continuously increases as the unit length of the HTS power cable increases. Among the many kinds of cryogenic refrigerator, a reverse Brayton refrigerator that uses turbo expanders is a promising refrigerator due to its efficiency and reliability. Among the various components in refrigerators, the cryogenic turbo-expander is the most important part for increasing efficiency and assuring reliability. The design of a 300 W class turbo-expander is described in this paper prior to the development of a 10 kW class turbo expander, which is the required capability for the commercialization of a HTS power cable. The impeller shape and rotation speed are determined based on the cycle analysis. The Eigen frequency and harmonic analysis are conducted with gas bearings at cryogenic temperatures to determine the operational stability.

• Tribology and Lubricants
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• v.37 no.3
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• pp.91-98
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• 2021

This paper presents a hydrostatic bearing design and rotordynamic analysis of a turbo expander for a hydrogen liquefaction plant. Th~e turbo expander includes the turbine and compressor wheel assembled to a shaft supported by two hydrostatic radial and thrust bearings. The rated speed is 75,000 rpm and the rated power is 6 kW. For the bearing operation, we use pressurized air at 8.5 bar as the lubricant that is supplied to the bearing through the orifice restrictor. We calculate the bearing stiffness and flow rate for various gauge pressure ratios and select the orifice diameter providing the maximum bearing stiffness. Additionally, we conduct a rotordynamic analysis based on the calculated bearing stiffness and damping considering design parameters of the turbo expander. The predicted Cambell diagram indicates that there are two critical speeds under the rated speed and there exists a sufficient separation margin for the rated speed. In addition, the predicted rotor vibration is under 1 ㎛ at the rated speed. We conduct the operating test of the turbo expander in the test rig. For the operation, we supply pressurized air to the turbine and monitor the shaft vibration during the test. The test results show that there are two critical speeds under the rated speed, and the shaft vibration is controlled under 2.5 ㎛.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Manufacturing Process Engineers
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• v.14 no.3
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• pp.141-148
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• 2015

The cryogenic cooling system should maintain the HTS power cable below 77 K. As the length of HTS power cables has increased, there have been many efforts to develop large capacity cryocoolers. Brayton, Joule-Thomson, and Claude refrigerators were considered for the large capacity cryocooler. Among the various cryocoolers, the Brayton refrigerator is the most competitive in terms of the HTS power cable. At present, it is thought that a 10-kW class refrigerator will be able to be used as a unit cooling system for the commercialization of HTS power cables in the near future. The Brayton refrigerator is composed of recuperative heat exchangers, a compressor, and a cryogenic turbo expander. Among the various components, the cryogenic turbo expander is the part that decreases the temperature, and it is the most significant component that is closely related with overall system efficiency. It rotates at high speed using high-pressure helium or neon gas at cryogenic temperatures. This paper describes the design of a 300-W class Brayton refrigeration cycle and the cryogenic turbo expander as a downscale model for the practical 10-kW class cycle. Flow and structural analyses are performed on the rotating impeller and nozzle to verify the efficiency and the design performance.

• Tribology and Lubricants
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• v.38 no.2
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• pp.33-40
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• 2022

In this study, we present rotor dynamic analysis and operation test of a turbo expander for a hydrogen liquefaction plant. The turbo expander consists of a turbine and compressor wheel connected to a shaft supported by two hydrostatic radial and thrust bearings. In rotor dynamic analysis, the shaft is modeled as a rigid body, and the equations of motion for the shaft are solved using the unsteady Reynolds equation. Additionally, the operating test of the turbo expander has been performed in the test rig. Pressurized helium is supplied to the bearings at 8.5 bar. Furthermore, we monitor the shaft vibration and flow rate of the helium supplied to the bearings. The rotor dynamic analysis result shows that there are two critical speeds related with the rigid body mode under 40,000 rpm. At the first critical speed of 36,000 rpm, the vibration at the compressor side is maximum, whereas that of the turbine is maximum at the second critical speed of 40,000 rpm. The predicted maximum shaft vibration is 3 ㎛, whereas sub-synchronous vibration is not presented. The operation test results show that there are two critical speeds under the rated speed, and the measured vibration value agrees well with predicted value. The measured flow rate of the helium supplied to the bearing is 2.0 g/s, which also agrees well with the predicted data.

• KEPCO Journal on Electric Power and Energy
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• v.2 no.2
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• pp.299-305
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• 2016

The High Temperature Superconducting power cables (HTS power cables) become increasingly longer to commercialize the HTS power cable system. Accordingly, demands on refrigerators of large cooling capacity per a unit system have been increased. In Korea, it is currently imported from abroad with the high price due to insufficient domestic technologies. In order to commercialize the HTS power cables, it is necessary to develop the refrigerators with large cooling capacity. The Brayton refrigerators are composed of recuperative heat exchangers, compressors and cryogenic turbo expanders. The most directly considering the efficiency of the Brayton refrigerator, it depends on performance of the cryogenic turbo expander. Rotating at high speed in cryogenic temperature, the cryogenic turbo expanders lower temperature by expanding high pressure of a helium or neon gas. In this paper, the reverse Brayton cycle is designed and the cryogenic turbo expander is designed in accordance with the thermodynamic cycle.