Biomimetic Stator Vane Design for Radial Turbines in Waste Heat Recovery Applications

Area of Science:

• Thermodynamics
• Fluid Mechanics
• Biomimetics

Background:

• Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) systems are crucial for low-temperature waste heat recovery.
• Turbine performance, especially stator vane design in radial turbines, significantly impacts ORC efficiency.
• Traditional straight vanes in radial turbines limit optimal airflow guidance.

Purpose of the Study:

• To introduce and evaluate a biomimetic design for radial inflow turbine stator vanes.
• To compare the performance of cambered vanes inspired by bird feathers against traditional straight vanes.
• To assess the impact of biomimetic vanes on ORC system power output and efficiency.

Main Methods:

• Implementation of cambered stator vanes with bird feather-inspired geometry in a radial inflow turbine.
• Computational simulations to compare the performance of the biomimetic design with a traditional straight-vane design.
• Analysis of airflow guidance, tangential speeds, and energy transfer characteristics.

Main Results:

• The biomimetic cambered stator vanes increased turbine power output from 388.6 kW to 394.87 kW.
• Overall ORC system efficiency improved from 8.78% to 10.12% with the new vane design.
• Moderate vane curvature (8-12%) yielded optimal performance enhancements.

Conclusions:

• Biomimetic cambered stator vanes offer a significant improvement over traditional designs in radial turbines.
• This approach effectively enhances energy transfer and boosts efficiency in ORC systems for waste heat recovery.
• The study validates the potential of bio-inspired design principles for optimizing turbomachinery performance.