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The Brayton Cycle: Regeneration

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Regeneration

Reheat
Intercooling
Regeneration with Reheat and Intercooling

A
Brayton Cycle with Regeneration
uses a heat exchanger called a regenerator to preheat the air-fuel mixture before it is fed to the combustion chamber using the turbine effluent as the heat source.

A
regenerator
reduces QC and QH for the cycle by the same amount. This has no effect on the power produced, but increases the
thermal efficiency
of the cycle.

Lesson 9F: page 2 of 12

A regenerator is a heat exchanger that is used to recover heat from the turbine exhaust that would otherwise be wasted.
This is accomplished by contacting the relatively hot turbine effluent stream with the relatively cool compressor effluent.
In this way, the air is pre-heated in the regenerator before it enters the combustion chamber.
The net result is a decrease in BOTH QH and QC and an increase the thermal efficiency of the cycle.
Now, let’s analyze a Regenerative Brayton Cycle to determine which operating parameters effect the thermal efficiency.