Patent Application
20090107111
The present invention relates to airborne pollutant reduction and/or treatment systems and methods. More particularly, but not by way of limitation, the present invention also relates to power generation systems and methods; in which, a driving fluid initiates a cavitation reaction as it undergoes a phase change and initiates a vacuum to a fluid system thus creating a flow, which is harnessed for generating electricity or providing motive force to a process system. Still more particularly, the present invention relates to a method of mixing emissions gases and steam and collectively or separately injecting these gases as a driving fluid into a working fluid, thereby creating a gas transfer mechanism for the reduction, dissolution, translation, and/or elimination of said contaminants and/or gases into the working fluid body. Even still more particularly, the present invention relates to a method of separating gaseous and solid components from the working fluid and/or recovering, reclaiming, recycling, converting, capturing, and/or sequestrating said components.
Combustion of coal and other fossil fuels primarily produces carbon dioxide (CO2), nitrogen oxides (NOx), and sulfur oxides (SOx), such as sulfur dioxide (SO2). Sulfur dioxide reacts with oxygen to form sulfur trioxide (SO3), which then reacts with water to form sulfuric acid (H2SO4) and in like manner, the nitrogen oxides evolve into nitric acid. Collectively, these acidic compounds contribute to the problem of acid rain.
To a lesser extent, the fossil-fueled power generating processes also introduce carbon monoxide (CO) and a host of other toxic metal micro-contaminants to the air, which primarily are not appreciably removed by current state-of-the-art pollution abatement systems. These micro contaminants may consist of heavy metals including: arsenic, lead, mercury, nickel, vanadium, beryllium, cadmium, barium, chromium, copper, molybdenum, zinc, selenium as well as certain naturally-occurring radioactive isotopes such as radium, uranium, and thorium.
The combustion of coal and other fossil fuels, is currently regarded by much of the world's scientific community as the primary source for the earth's greenhouse gas situation; whereas, the burning of hydrocarbons, and the associated anthropogenic CO2 emissions, is considered a serious threat to the stability of the global climate.
Another issue of concern is that many power-generating plants throughout the world, cool the hot water in an evaporative cooling tower process; whereas, large hyperbolic (mechanical or natural draft) cooling towers are used extensively for this purpose. Even though, most of the heated vapor/water throughput is cooled via this method, a significant amount of water vapor is expelled to the atmosphere, which may be as much as several hundred thousand gallons per hour.
The present invention comprises a method and system for the abatement of certain fossil fuel combustion-related pollutants as well as many other forms of airborne pollutants pursuant to other industrial applications and process systems. In addition to power plant operations other industrial-scale boiler operations, manufacturing processes, petroleum refineries, and/or petrochemical operations generate airborne pollutants and may benefit from the environmental benefits and economies made possible through the present invention's technology.
In addition to these attributes, the current invention provides both means and method for reducing evaporative cooling and/or heat exchange system losses from power plants to the atmosphere. Further, this invention provides an alternative to certain power plant facilities employing cooling processes, which utilize methods of direct discharge of cooling fluids into bodies of water; wherein, the thermal impact of these discharges constitutes an ecological imbalance.
Also, various embodiments of the present invention comprise a means, method and system for the capture, purification, sequestration, and/or recovery of carbon dioxide from said emissions.
Also, the by-products of the present invention's system include, but are not limited to, construction materials, such as concrete, as well as agricultural products, such as fertilizers, in addition to other industrial and commercially beneficial products.
Various systems are known for the environmental control of industrial emissions, hydroelectric generation, and the use of steam; however prior to this invention, no other invention has endeavored to employ a novel arrangement of unique methods and mechanisms for reducing airborne pollutant emissions and a means of producing a quantity of recoverable energy by the same.
The present invention differs significantly from these, and other, examples of prior art in its purpose, the scope of its approach and the mechanisms thereto employed. These differences should be readily apparent to those skilled in the art.
There is significant difference between “bubbles” and “cavities”; even though, both terms commonly refer to accumulations of gas phase molecules within a liquid and are typically referred to as “bubbles.” The present invention uses both bubbles and cavities, within various embodiments of its process, as mechanisms of treatment and transformation.
In the context of this application, the term “bubbles” is often defined as pockets of gas, which primarily do not involve molecules changing phases. Bubbles compress and expand at various stages within the present invention's process system and accordingly, they diffuse effectively into the fluid in which they are suspended. In gas transfer and bubble filtration applications, it is desirable to reduce bubble size, which maximizes the amount of gases suspended in the liquid. This reduction in bubble size increases the reactive contact area with the pollutants and the fluid medium to be treated per unit mass of active substance.
In the context of this application, the term “cavities” is often defined as pockets of vacuum voids involving a molecular phase change; whereas, these cavities are almost instantaneously created, and almost instantaneously imploded, thus creating said gas pocket voids. Accordingly, as the molecules change phases from gas back to liquid, the implosion releases extreme energies in the form of shock wave pressures and heat.
Initially, the diffused injection of steam within a fluid body creates many small natural cavities and are usually small to microscopic in size; however in some instances, the cavities will coalesce into larger and larger vacuum voids and eventually become macroscopic and are thus sometimes referred to as “Super Cavities” or “Super Cavitation.”
In the cavitation process, gas phase molecules coalesce or accumulate into enlarging pockets of gas and eventually accumulate into large visible structures appearing as strings, sheets, and flame like shapes. Cavitation pockets are also inclined to attach themselves to objects in the flow path and thus cause damage to said objects by means of micro-jet impact and supersonic shockwave erosional influence.
For steam injection purposes, the factor of volumetric contraction is the inverse factor of steam's volume expansion ratio, whereby the volume occupied by the molecules is reduced by a factor of 1,675 for a steam to water phase change at near atmospheric conditions. Accordingly, when steam is injected into a body of fluid, the increasing fluid pressure surrounding the cavities forces the cavity walls inwards and thereby compresses the gas inside the cavity. This compression continues until the vapor pressure is reached, at which point the process changes dramatically from compression into a phase change and, near instantaneously, the gas molecules change phases from gas to liquid.
With gas pressure no longer supporting the interior walls of the cavity, the walls of the cavity rapidly move inwards. The process of the liquid rushing to re-occupy the vacuum cavity is commonly referred to as an implosion; whereas, the walls of the cavity race inwards at extremely high velocities, colliding with extreme force and releasing substantial levels of energy within a very brief period of time.
Normally, when steam pressure is injected into a fluid body, the result is a turbulent implosion reaction whereas over a 1675:1 reduction of steam volume occurs at supersonic speed. This manner of cavity implosion is a violent and chaotic process and is influenced by a host of variables.
As a process fluid, water's combination of small heavy molecules and high cavity wall implosion velocities (resulting from the sharp and fast rate of phase change), results in the release of extreme inertial energies as the walls of the cavity strike against each other and against objects in the fluid flow path during the cavity implosion episodes. When steam pressure and exhausted gases are mixed together and introduced to a fluid, the implosion episodes are somewhat less forceful than that generated by the injection of steam pressure alone. The mixture's volume reduces rapidly and the excess emissions gases are compressed by the turbulent condensation of the steam pressure. The mixture of gases contract and re-expand in the turbulent flow induced by the violence of the imploding forces and the resulting fluid vacuum effect. This event generates a multiplicity of diffused bubbles and creates a transitional foaming state of hyper turbulent fluid and gas dynamics, which constitutes an efficient mechanism for the gas transfer and filtration of airborne pollutants to be transferred and/or dissolved into the fluid body. Also, it is an attribute of such hydrodynamically turbulent flow patterns to provide high heat flux cooling capabilities, which correspond to efficient reductions in the temperatures of the gas load suspended within a turbulent flow.
The implosion mechanism of this invention creates a vast number of turbulent bubbles within the process fluid reservoirs, which are far greater in number and smaller in size than can be achieved through aeration devices. Thus not only is the particulate removal efficiency of this invention much greater than comparable gas phase treatment technologies based upon charged particle or charged droplet based systems, but also the gas scrubbing effect is optimized and the emissions gasses are dissolved more efficiently into the Working Fluid than by other treatment methodologies.
In the current invention's process system, the implosion principle is an integrated component of the treatment system. During the initial stages of the implosion process, as a low pressure void forms in the space formally occupied by the steam, the surrounding fluids rush in to fill the void according to the principles of Raleigh's Law. Thus when this cavitation, or ‘water hammer’ type reaction occurs, a mass of water traveling at high speed is rapidly decelerated by the imploding collision and a high energy wave is dissipated as a high pressure wave, or acoustic wave traveling at supersonic speed through the fluid reservoir system. The resulting collision of the fluid cavity walls generates an over-pressurization event, which reverberates throughout the fluid body's reservoir.
Water containing solids, gases, and other ingredients behaves more non-homogenously than does pure water alone; in that, it causes a “blurred” or lesser defined phase change reaction. These added ‘ingredients’ reduce the rate of cavity creation and collapse, as well as lowering the amount of energy released by the implosion in addition to reducing the potential for damage caused by the cavitation process.
As cavities implode and bubbles collapse and re-expand, several mechanisms are at work therein to accomplish the intended purpose of this invention:
England's Sir William George Armstrong, (1810-1900) built an electrostatic boiler in 1842 due to his fascination with electrically charged steam. Later in 1887, Richard von Helmholtz discovered that small, electrically charged, particles possessed a remarkable ability to condense steam around them. Still several years later in 1894, Nobel Prize winner Sir J. J. Thomson further studied this phenomenon and developed the framework for much of our current understanding of the interaction between charged particles and steam.
There are many inventions, which use electrostatic influence to remove airborne pollutants. Some of these inventions seek to charge the particulates in an airborne emissions stream while other inventions are founded upon charging an airborne dispersion of liquid droplets.
Certain embodiments of this invention utilizes a two, or more, phase approach to electrostatic influencing the removal of pollutants in a very novel arrangement much different and more effective than that of prior art technologies.
This invention relates to the science of pollutant treatment.
The present invention uniquely employs a gas phase mixture of exhaust and/or emissions as well as steam, which in certain embodiments, are combined either prior to, or subsequent to, injection within the process system's fluid reservoir. As such, the thermodynamic energy cycle employed is a variation of the Rankine Cycle; whereas, heat is transferred from a constant temperature source and energy is extracted from the process as the heat is dispensed at lower temperatures.
The present invention utilizes an Injection Chamber Mechanism for combining the steam and emissions gas mixture within the process system's fluid reservoir. This Injection Chamber is the point of interface where the enthalpy or internal energy of the gas/vapor mixture, or Driving Fluid, is translated into kinetic energy as the hydrodynamic interaction occurs within the process fluid body (or Working Fluid as referred to herein).
When the mixed gas/steam blend (or Driving Fluid as referred to herein) is injected in and through the current invention's Injection Chamber Mechanism, the volume of gases almost immediately respond to the cooler fluid temperatures by violently imploding a portion the injected gas mixture's volume. The implosion of these vacuum void cavities impacts the gas phase bubbles of the exhausted gas volumes and creates a turbulent mass of contracting and expanding bubbles, which disperse into a foaming mixture of very fine bubbles within the process system's fluid reservoir.
The implosion-generated foaming mass of bubbles, containing various gaseous and particulate contaminates, are immediately subject to a bubble filtration influence pursuant to the nature of the process environment. Further, gas transfer dynamics occur rapidly as the foaming mass of bubbles are carried through the process system and kept in a turbulent state by various process components including, but not limited to, in-line mixing devices and turbulence inducing process flow pattern geometries. By keeping the fluid flow channel subject to the turbulent influence of the gas transfer process is maximized as the residence time of each micro bubble is extended by the transport distance of the fluid and gas suspension within the process system.
Another mechanism of the process is contributed by the suspended solids of process reactant or reactants, which are added to the process fluid reservoir and exert a neutralizing influence upon the ionic state of the process fluid suspension. As the process fluids are acidified by the contaminant influence, they are accordingly neutralized by the reactant suspension and generate an agglomerating suspended solids component within the process fluid flow channel.
When the process fluids reach the Gas/Solids Separation Unit, the carbon dioxide, nitrogen, carbon monoxide and other residual gases are released to a secondary process for subsequent gas treatment, recycling, capture, and/or sequestration activities, or are released to the atmosphere, provided the toxicity of the gaseous emissions is reduced to legally acceptable limits.
Accordingly, the neutralized suspended solids load is flocculated and removed from the reservoir fluids by both the first and second phase of the process solids separation components. The solids are recycled into construction, agricultural, and/or other products or materials for beneficial reutilization purposes and/or are regenerated for subsequent reclamation as a reactant. The clarified process reservoir fluids are routed through the return fluids network to the Injection Chamber by means of vacuum induced flow and/or gravity or pumping.
In certain embodiments of the present invention, a Hydro Turbine unit is located on the return fluid network and is subject to the propulsion influence exerted by the induced vacuum flow forces generated in the Injection Chamber and gas Transition Mixing Conduit portions of the process system. The flow of the process system's Working Fluid delivers force to the Hydro Turbine, which generates torque or thrust to drive an electrical generator, a pump, or other process device for recovering energy from the steam condensation implosion-induced forces.
To present an example of the current invention's gaseous treatment process mechanisms, a typical coal-fired power plant emissions scenario will be addressed and hydrated lime will be selected as the reactant substance to be used for said process example. Accordingly, the “lime” may consist of various concentrations of calcium oxide, calcium hydroxide, and calcium carbonate.
As previously described, the injection of combustion exhausts, or emissions, as well as steam, results in a turbulent reaction within the process system and creates a very dense mixture of small gas bubbles, which are transported within the process system's fluid flow pattern.
The reactant is typically added to the system's fluid reservoir at a position prior to the steam/gas mixture injection points; wherein the injection turbulence creates an optimal chemical reaction environment for mixing, bubble filtration, gas transfer, neutralization, and dissolution mechanisms.
On a weight fraction basis, bituminous coal, for instance, generates combustion gas mixtures primarily composed of 71% nitrogen and 25% carbon dioxide. The remaining balance of coal combustion gas is comprised of CO, NOx, SOx, water vapor, and a blend of micro contaminant components. To evaluate the fate of combustion byproduct gasses in this invention's treatment environment, a typical coal combustion emission gas blend will be examined. Therefore, the pollutants of coal combustion and this invention's treatment mechanisms for said pollutants are more particularly described as follows:
When nitrogen dioxide reacts with water the following chemical reaction occurs: 2NO2+H2O→HNO2+HNO3 (nitrogen dioxide+water→nitrous acid+nitric acid). Calcium carbonate reacts with nitric acid to form calcium nitrate: CaCO3+2HNO3→Ca(NO3)2CaNO3+CO2+H2O Additionally, mono-nitrogen oxides also eventually form nitric acid when dissolved in water and are thus subject to like neutralization reaction. Other reactions in this process mechanism include:
CaO+HNO3→Ca(NO3)2
Ca(OH)2+2HNO3→Ca(NO3)2+2H2O
In particular, calcium oxide (lime) reacts with sulfur dioxide to form calcium sulfite: CaO+SO2→CaSO3 and aerobic oxidation converts this CaSO3 into gypsum or (CaSO4). Other reactions in this process mechanism include:
2CaO+2SO2+O2→2CaSO4
Ca(OH)2+SO2+½O2→CaSO4+2H2O
2CaCO3+2SO2+O2→2CaSO4+2CO2
Although, the carbon monoxide content of coal combustion exhaust is relatively de minimis, it remains a toxic gas emission and represents a measure of impact upon the environment; moreover, the current invention incorporates a mechanism for its removal.
In certain embodiments of the present invention, steam and combustion emissions are mixed prior to injection in the invention's process system fluids. This process mechanism provides the reactive environment necessary to support a high temperature—water gas shift reaction or a (HT) CO shift conversion reaction. In this manner the carbon monoxide component of the emissions gas flow is subjected to pressurized steam and a water gas shift reaction results, which translates the carbon monoxide into hydrogen gas and carbon dioxide.
For example: CO+H2O→CO2+H2
Carbon dioxide has only limited solubility in water at approximately 2,000 mg/l which is only 4 thousandths of a pound of CO2 per liter of water. Yet, as the carbon dioxide progressively dissolves in water; whereas the carbon dioxide (CO2) reacts with water (H2O) to form carbonic acid (H2CO3), and then carbonic acid partially dissociates to form hydrogen (H+) and bicarbonate ions (HCO3−).
As the water's bicarbonate ion content rises and it becomes increasingly acidic and it becomes corrosive to the lime reactant within the reservoir fluids. The carbonated water or the system's reservoir and the Reactant compounds react to generate soluble bicarbonate ions.
Because the waste-gas stream of a power plant has a high carbon dioxide concentration, the water acidification loading will be rapid and will lead to an efficient dissolution of the neutralizing substance or Reactant.
A number of reactions occur when the process reactant is lime-based product containing various concentrations of calcium oxide, calcium hydroxide, and/or calcium carbonate:
CaO+CO2→CaCO3
CaO+H2O→Ca(OH)2
Ca(OH)2+CO2→CaCO3+H2O
CaCO3+H2O+CO2→Ca(HCO3)2
CaCO3+H2CO3→Ca2++2HCO3−
CO2+H2O→H2CO3
H2CO3+2OH−→(CO3)2−+4H2O
Ca2++(CO3)2−→CaCO3
At subsequent process components, such as the gas separation mechanism or the clarifier mechanism, the insoluble calcium carbonate precipitate and other solid precipitates, flocculate and are removed from the process system for beneficial reutilization or recycling purposes.
Although a portion of the carbon dioxide emissions is converted in the present invention's primary treatment mechanism, referred to herein as the Phase 1—CO2 Treatment System, the remaining portion of carbon dioxide can purified by the other optional treatment mechanisms and the effluent from the gas separation unit mechanism is primarily a filtered blend of nitrogen and carbon dioxide.
In certain embodiments of this invention's Phase 2—CO2 Treatment System mechanism, the filtered gases from the Gas/Solids Separation Unit are routed to and through an absorbent and/or adsorbent reactor and/or membrane unit where the carbon dioxide is transferred to an absorbent or adsorbent fluid or solid substance and thus routed to a desorption mechanism where pure carbon dioxide is recovered, compressed, and liquefied for sale or otherwise reutilized.
The absorbent and/or adsorbent substance utilized by this sub-process contains at least one of the following compounds: Monoethanolamine, Diethanolamine, Diglycolamine, Methyldiethanolamine, Monoethanolamine-Glycol Mixtures, Diispropanolamine, Mixed Amines, Sterically Hindered Amines, Alkanolamines, and/or other such Amine Concentrations.
The process reactant is added to the treatment system's reservoir fluids and physically consist of a pulverized solid, semi-solid, and/or liquid, which contains one or more of the following substances: calcium carbonate, calcium oxide, calcium hydroxide, potassium hydroxide, magnesium hydroxide, magnesium carbonate, magnesium oxide, ammonium hydroxide, sodium hydroxide, magnesium chloride, olivine, serpentine, antigorite, basaltic formation minerals, brucite, lizardite, cement, wollastonite, magnesium silicate, and calcium silicate, potassium carbonate, magnesite, silica and iron oxide, magnetite, sodium carbonate, and/or any combination thereof.
Particles are, by definition, both solid bits and tiny liquid droplets of condensed pollutants. Size definition for both solid particles and liquid particles has been established by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency as follows:
The current invention's process acts as a treatment system for the efficient removal of airborne particulates of all size ranges. Certain embodiments of this invention's process system employ a two-phase approach to the particulate removal task.
In phase one, the deliberate mixing of steam and emissions creates the first treatment opportunity and, by means of induced electrical current, the gas/steam mixture is passed through either a screen or corona wire array and/or the steam is injected through a charged network of nozzles or orifices. The steam component in the mixture develops a slight positive charge and electrostatically influences the capture of particulates in the hyper dense field of steam surrounding said particulates.
Many prior art inventions seek to use electrostatic influence to remove airborne pollutants by either charging the particulates themselves in the emissions stream or by charging a field of dispersed atomized liquid droplets. Conversely, this invention's direct use of steam and subsequent indirect use of steam condensation is a novel improvement from prior art, which translates into a higher degree of particulate removal efficiency.
This invention's electrostatic influence component allows for the efficient mixing of suspended particulates and charged steam droplets. When distances of 25 microns or less exist between the individual particulates and the steam droplets, the induced electrical forces create a field of mutual attraction; whereas, the particle and the droplet are enjoined. The current invention's field of steam creates such a dense atmosphere that this electrical current induction process step may not prove to be necessary for many emissions scenarios given the effective nature of the dense particulate/steam atmosphere and the subsequent downstream treatment mechanisms; however, certain applications may benefit from the inclusion of this step if emissions to steam ratios are disproportionably high and the subsequent reservoir transition phase residence time is brief.
In phase two, the deliberate injection of the emissions and steam mixture into the process fluid reservoir creates the second particulate treatment opportunity.
As previously discussed herein, the dynamics of the implosion and the gas phase transitions, contractions and expansions all collectively create a high level of turbulence and a mass of extremely fine bubbles in the process flow network.
The hydrodynamic impact forces associated with the formation and subsequent collapse of bubbles in this invention's fluid reservoir forms a turbulent multitude of small bubbles within the liquid in a very brief period of time. In this frothing bubble phase, larger particulates are immediately absorbed into the fluid and smaller particulates, on the order of 0.01 μm, are trapped inside the small bubbles and electrostatically attracted to the positive charged liquid interface of the bubble border. Accordingly, particulates, large and small alike, are absorbed into the fluid medium and within this turbulent multiplicity of small bubbles and highly efficient gas scrubbing occurs; whereas, emissions gases are dissolved and/or neutralized by the reservoir fluids and its associated reactant component/s.
In essence, the first and second phase treatment environments are inversely related as in the first phase particles are suspended in a dense field of charged steam droplets and in the second phase, residual particles are suspended with micro-bubbles inside a field of charged fluid. The following Table 1.0 illustrates these process phenomena.
When a cavitation bubble expands and collapses in the vicinity of a rigid wall, at the bubble interface, hydrodynamic instabilities lead to the generation of high speed or supersonic micro jet, which emanates from the collapsing bubble when the standoff parameter falls below a critical value. At the final stage of the bubble collapse episode, strong shock waves, along with the micro-jet mechanisms, contribute in the erosion process.
Various embodiments of the present invention make use of several mechanisms to protect its process system from excessive erosional wear and accordingly, preserve the system's structural integrity. These mechanisms are:
Durable System Materials—The present invention makes use of cavitation resistant materials in process areas subjected to such implosion forces. These process components subject to cavitation erosion hazards, are constructed of one or more materials including steel, stainless steel, titanium, tungsten, chromium, nickel, molybendum, ceramic, and/or other metallic compounds identified in Groups 3 through 10 of the Periodic Table of Elements.
Gas Phase Bubble Cushioning—By injecting both exhaust and steam into the process system, both bubbles and cavities are formed and the interaction between these two gas phase products makes use of the natural buffering of the emissions gas bubbles and provides a cushioning mechanism to absorb the water hammer influence of the implosion process, thus preventing the system structure from absorbing the full impact of the supersonic wave episodes introduced by the implosion processes.
Injection Diffusion—The present invention makes use of steam and exhaust injection component embodiments, which disperse the Driving Fluid's steam component/s into an injected mass of smaller bubbles. The smaller the bubble size being subject to implosion, the smaller the relative shockwave strength released during each episode. By inducing a dispersion of smaller steam bubbles using nozzles and constricting orifice ports, the current invention benefits from less structural erosion of its system components and a smoother movement of fluid occurs due to the induced vacuum force therein.
Targeted Cavitation Zones—The present invention makes use of steam and exhaust injection embodiments, which target the impact zone of the cavitation forces into areas of process system geometries less inclined to the destructive forces of the cavitation processes. Since, cavitation bubbles tend to attach themselves to structures, the injection nozzle components of this invention reduce bubble size to prevent this occurrence. Also, certain embodiments of this invention induce vortex flow zone patterns within the process system which enhance the intra-system movement of fluids and the consistent vacuum of the process fluid flow pattern without generating excessive cavitation into the system structural components.
Thermal Regulation of Process Fluids—The present invention makes use of process control technology to meter in appropriate concentrations of steam and exhaust as well as controlling the system component input and output flow patterns for the purpose of regulating system fluid temperatures. Heated process fluids react with less imploding violence than do cooler fluids. By controlling process system Working Fluid temperatures, the optimal balance of system performance and operational erosion prevention is maintained the current invention.
Other Shock Absorbing Media in Process Flow—The present invention makes use of certain low density foam, synthetic, and/or natural pellets, nodules, or particulate media, which do not present excessive interference with turbine performance or other system operations; whereas, said nodules float through the system's reservoir and creates a shock absorbing interface for acoustic wave energy to be dampened.
There are several embodiments of the present invention which allow for multiple system arrangements with treatment process variation flexibilities broad enough to address a range of airborne pollutant scenarios as well as diverse end purpose objectives. The present invention's basic operation is comprised by the following steps:
Well Points—Certain embodiments of the present invention, may be arranged to utilize one or more subsurface well points or combinations of types thereof. The use of well points for the circulation of the system Working Fluid has distinct advantages:
In certain embodiments of the present invention, there are four general types of well point configurations, which may be used in singular or unison process arrangements. These well point types are more precisely described as follows:
Open Circuit Treatment System (Figure H)—Certain embodiments of the current invention may or may not involve a toxic emissions element with steam pressure. In an Open Circuit Treatment System where the emissions are relatively non-toxic due to the use of certain alternative fuels or clean energy resources, the Working Fluid may be clean enough to warrant direct release into a body of water and/or drawing replacement fluids from the same.
Steam to Energy System (Figure I)—Certain embodiments of the current invention may or may not involve mixing emissions with steam pressure. In a steam to energy system cycle, steam pressure, from any means of steam generation (including but not limited to combustion of fossil fuels, nuclear reactors, solar reactors, geothermal, wind resources, etc.), may be translated into the motive force of a fluid; whereas the motive force provides a means of generating hydroelectric power and/or providing power to another turbine, pump, or other such apparatus designed to extract energy from the movement of a fluid.
The steam pressures utilized can also either be insufficient to drive a conventional steam turbine or the steam pressure may be a de-energized outlet pressure from a steam turbine. In each case, the current invention's Injection Chamber Mechanism can provide vacuum thrust to the process fluid or Working Fluid and thus power a Hydro Turbine and/or generator assembly to create electricity or provide motive force for another beneficial purpose.
Explosive or Thermobaric Reaction Energy Process Treatment System (Figures: J, K, L, and W)—Although, the current invention has obvious application and benefit to combustion exhaust and other industrial process emissions treatment scenarios, certain embodiments of the current invention be employed with explosive or thermobaric reaction energy processes; whereas, such energy processes may involve pulse/impulse dissociation and/or steam conversion elements.
Exhaust to Energy System (Figure C)—Certain embodiments of the current invention may include a process arrangement component for recovering energy from the filtered gas discharges from the process system. In this embodiment configuration, a windmill or wind turbine is encased within a gas transport pipe or duct or is positioned on the effluent end of the exhaust gas flow; whereas, said gaseous flow provides motive force to the turbine blades or windmill fan and rotational energy is supplied to the generator thus producing a quantity of electricity.
In view of the preferred embodiments described above, it should be apparent to those skilled in the art that the present invention may be embodied in forms other than those specifically described herein without departing from the spirit or central characteristics of the invention. Thus, the specific embodiments described herein are to be considered as illustrative and by no means restrictive.
The above description is that of a preferred embodiment of the invention. Multiple modifications and variations are possible in light of the above teachings. It is therefore to be understood that, within the scope of the appended claims, the invention may be practiced otherwise than as specifically described. Any reference to claim elements in the singular, e.g. using the articles “a,” “an,” “the,” or “said” is not construed as limiting the element to the singular.
Further, it is to be understood that the present invention is not limited to the embodiments described above, but encompasses any and all embodiments within the scope of the preceding claims. None of the above inventions and patents, taken either singly or in combination, is seen to describe the instant invention as claimed.
