Optimisation of the thermo-economic performance of an irreversible Carnot heat engine

SYNOPSIS The thermo-economic function, defined as the total cost of the engine system per unit power output of an irreversible Carnot heat engine cycle, is studied in detail. The objective function is optimised with respect to the temperature ratio of the working substance in the two isothermal processes and the optimum operation parameters are calculated for a typical set of operating conditions. It is found that there are the optimal values of the temperature ratio of the working substance in the two isothermal processes and the thermal efficiency of the cycle at which the objective function has a minimum. The maximum power output associated with thermo-economic performance and the corresponding parameters are also derived for a typical set of operating parameters. The influence of different parameters on the performance of the system is discussed in detail. It is important that some significant results obtained by earlier workers can be directly derived as special cases of the present paper.