THE COMPACT STEAM TURBINE –A NOVEL APPROACH TO SMALL SCALE COMBINED HEAT AND POWER GENERATION

Current power plant technology needs to be simplified in order to be useful for small-scale systems. The small-scale turbine which represents an integrated small power plant originally invented at the Hochschule Darmstadt addresses this demand. Essentially, it is a very special application of a rotating heat pipe. It consists of rotating parts, thus reversing the traditional arrangement in a turbine. The device is divided by a plate into an evaporation and condensation chamber. This construction allows higher pressure differences so that a RHP can operate as a central part of a small power plant.