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Combined power plants, including Combined Cycle Gas Turbine (CCGT) plants
Energy Vol. 18, No. 6, p. 703, 1993 Pergamon Press Ltd. Printed in Great Britain.
Book Review of Combined Power Plants. includine Combined Cvcle Gas Turbine (CCGT) Plants. 288 pp. by J. H. Horlock. Pereamon Press. Oxford (1992). US $110 Publication of this book by an acknowledged leader in the field will be welcome and of special interest to many of the readers of this journal. The discussion deals with the fundamental science involved in energy conservation and costing of combined power plants. The topical area of exergy analysis was dealt with in depth in a special issue of this journal in 1980. In a world recognizing limited resources, it is difficult to find any topic of greater pertinence to human welfare than the subject of this book. Horlock’s book is a concise exposition of the field. It contains the contemporary version of the next step after an introductory course in thermodynamics to which essentially all engineering, science and economics majors-are exposed. Its study will facilitate reading of the current literature in the rapidly expanding field of applied science and engineering dealing with the optimization of combined power plants. Chapter 1 is a review of power-plant thermodynamics. Chapters 2 to 4 deal, respectively, with combined power-plant classification, thermodynamics, and parametric evaluation. The numerous applications described in Chapter 4 represent nearly one quarter of the total book and provide an excellent overview of the current literature on combined cycles. The topics availability, reversibility and exergy are first introduced in Sec. 1.6 and then used in Chapter 5 (entitled exergy analysis) for the study of combined-cycle components and plants. Chapter 6 deals with pricing, rates of return and exergoeconomics. A selection of practical combined power plants is analyzed in Chapter 7, which is followed by a brief historical perspective of the field in Chapter 8. It should be noted that the research papers on exergoeconomics published or about to appear in this journal (e.g., papers by Tsatsaronis, Valero, Von Spakovsky, Frangopoulos, and others) generally represent analyses at levels of detail and sophistication that are well beyond the bounds of Horlock’s introductory text. There are no exercises or problems included in the book, which is not much of a drawback since the entire exposition represents a sequence of practical analyses of real systems at a level appropriate for graduate and practicing engineers. The reader will find some misprints [e.g., in the first line of Eq. (1.53)], occasional incomplete or cavalier treatment of the (admittedly small) entropy of mixing [e.g., in Eq. (5.2)] and occasional lack of care in distinguishing between work and power. The comments on exergoecomics should be of special interest to those of our readers studying current and forthcoming publications on this topic in this journal. Horlock has rendered a welcome service to all who are concerned with a scientific and practically useful approach to energy conservation in combined power plants. His book is a readable introductory text to this field. S. S. Penner University of California, San Diego
703
Book Review of Combined Power Plants. includine Combined Cvcle Gas Turbine (CCGT) Plants. 288 pp. by J. H. Horlock. Pereamon Press. Oxford (1992). US $110 Publication of this book by an acknowledged leader in the field will be welcome and of special interest to many of the readers of this journal. The discussion deals with the fundamental science involved in energy conservation and costing of combined power plants. The topical area of exergy analysis was dealt with in depth in a special issue of this journal in 1980. In a world recognizing limited resources, it is difficult to find any topic of greater pertinence to human welfare than the subject of this book. Horlock’s book is a concise exposition of the field. It contains the contemporary version of the next step after an introductory course in thermodynamics to which essentially all engineering, science and economics majors-are exposed. Its study will facilitate reading of the current literature in the rapidly expanding field of applied science and engineering dealing with the optimization of combined power plants. Chapter 1 is a review of power-plant thermodynamics. Chapters 2 to 4 deal, respectively, with combined power-plant classification, thermodynamics, and parametric evaluation. The numerous applications described in Chapter 4 represent nearly one quarter of the total book and provide an excellent overview of the current literature on combined cycles. The topics availability, reversibility and exergy are first introduced in Sec. 1.6 and then used in Chapter 5 (entitled exergy analysis) for the study of combined-cycle components and plants. Chapter 6 deals with pricing, rates of return and exergoeconomics. A selection of practical combined power plants is analyzed in Chapter 7, which is followed by a brief historical perspective of the field in Chapter 8. It should be noted that the research papers on exergoeconomics published or about to appear in this journal (e.g., papers by Tsatsaronis, Valero, Von Spakovsky, Frangopoulos, and others) generally represent analyses at levels of detail and sophistication that are well beyond the bounds of Horlock’s introductory text. There are no exercises or problems included in the book, which is not much of a drawback since the entire exposition represents a sequence of practical analyses of real systems at a level appropriate for graduate and practicing engineers. The reader will find some misprints [e.g., in the first line of Eq. (1.53)], occasional incomplete or cavalier treatment of the (admittedly small) entropy of mixing [e.g., in Eq. (5.2)] and occasional lack of care in distinguishing between work and power. The comments on exergoecomics should be of special interest to those of our readers studying current and forthcoming publications on this topic in this journal. Horlock has rendered a welcome service to all who are concerned with a scientific and practically useful approach to energy conservation in combined power plants. His book is a readable introductory text to this field. S. S. Penner University of California, San Diego
703