Efficient use of waste heat and solar energy: Technologies of cooling, heating, power generation and heat transfer

摘要

As a research focus, energy conservation has attracted a great deal of attention in recent years due to the energy crisis and environmental pollution concerns. Many countries made great efforts on both research and implementing energy conservation technologies. Currently more than 50% of the total world's delivered energy is consumed by industry and about one sixth of the total energy consumed is wasted as low-grade heat, for example through radiation loss, exhaust gas flows, and cooling fluid circuits. Therefore, the recovery and reuse of waste heat is an effective way to significantly improve energy utilization. In addition, solar energy can provide low grade heat and is a clean and renewable form of energy. The efficient use of low grade heat from these sources can play an important role for a large number of applications.