Hydrogen utilization by steam turbine cycles

Based on thermodynamic analysis, the paper presents the utilization of hydrogen in steam turbine cycles. Various configurations (GRAZ, TOSHIBA, WESTINGHOUSE and MNRC) proposed in literature are recalculated using the same software and the same thermodynamic functions, thus comparisons can be made. It is possible to achieve efficiency levels of 60% (HHV based) which is at least 10 percent points higher than the efficiency of the most efficient current power units. The investigated systems are characterized by very high specific power (2,200.. 4,700 kJ/kg), which is much higher (in extreme cases, by an order of magnitude) than the performance of current gas or steam turbines or combined cycles.