Wilson TurboPower Achieves Heat Exchanger Breakthrough

Super-High Temperatures and Efficiency, Now Demonstrated, Can Enhance Fuel Cell, Microturbine, and Other Industrial Process Performance

Woburn, MA - Wilson TurboPower has achieved a breakthrough in industrial heat exchangers that the industry has been trying to accomplish since 1940. Using MIT-patented technology, licensed exclusively to WTPI, it has demonstrated operating temperatures above the ranges at which metal heat exchangers typically perform, in excess of 1650 F (900 C). With further development, it is expected to operate at even higher temperatures.

WTPI's ceramic rotary "regenerator" also transfers heat from one gas to another at exceptionally high efficiencies, in excess of 98%. To achieve this same level of efficiency, metal heat exchangers typically must be substantially larger.

WTPI's super regenerators, called Cerotex, will enable lower cost electricity from fuel cells and microturbines than is possible using current heat exchangers. They will also enable a variety of other applications to operate at higher efficiencies, thereby saving both energy and cost. Examples include hydrogen reforming, metal refining, and food and pharmaceutical processing. The regenerator can also be used in cold applications such as air-cycle cooling and refrigeration.

The rotary regenerative heat exchanger was patented by Fredrik Ljungstrom in 1920. Until now, such regenerators were designed to be rotated steadily and continuously and were used mainly for gases near atmospheric pressure. The attempts that have been made beginning in 1940 to adapt them for use in high-pressure applications have been unsuccessful due to wear and leakage of the seals. Based on the work of Professor David Gordon Wilson at MIT's Heat Transfer Laboratory, MIT was awarded a patent for the concept of rotating the disk or drum discontinuously rather than continuously. The seals are pressed on to the disk or drum face when it is stationary, about 95% of the time, and are lifted very slightly when the disk or drum is rapidly indexed to a new position.

SOURCE: Wilson TurboPower