Low temperature thermal energy to power
High-torque high-pressure process
Zero emissions process
Small footprint
Broader operational range than current technologies
The Marnoch Thermal Energy conversion process is patented, de-risked, and proven technology that converts heat to power.
Our technology consists of a series of individual modules interconnected to a common drivetrain and transmission. This is a patented process flow step that gives our technology a major advantage.
Our technology can access thermal energy that is too low in temperature for other methods such as Organic Rankine Cycles. It will have a profound effect on the net capital cost of the unit.
Heat and Temperature are not the same thing. A greater volume of heat at a lower temp. can compensate for the greater content at a higher temp. The challenge is to process that heat at a rate equal or better, and accomplish the process in a more efficient manner and lesser capital cost. Our technology does that.
Final pre-commercial prototype.
This unit operated at a maximum source temp of 80°C, and with an ambient sink temp of 30°C in summer. When the outside ambient temp was -30, the output more than doubled in accordance with thermodynamic efficiency. This is an advantage that western Canada and northern Europe has due to the exceptionally low winter temps and therefore the exponentially greater contribution it makes to the energy requirements in winter. The pre-charge was only 400psi. We will be deploying the pilot installation at 2130psi delivering a median torque 5 times greater to the transmission/gearmotor.
Rankine or Organic Rankine Cycles have been in use for centuries with various working fluids.
Due to the limitations of those fluids however, they cannot maintain meaningful pressures through the turbines at low temperature differentials without returning to a liquid state. This necessitates ever larger units to accommodate low pressure vapour and therefore exponentially increase capital cost per Kw, rendering them non-viable in most locales.
This also restricts their deployment options due to the enormity of their footprint relative to the application.
Our technology on the other hand has various installation options due to its modular configuration. It uses nitrogen as the working fluid and a proprietary heat transfer fluid that has a functional range of -110°C to +250°C.
Nitrogen maintains a gaseous state as low as -196°C and even under pressure of 500 Bar (7000 psi) at -100°C.
This allows extremely high pressure differentials between the modules and because of the increased density and proprietary heat exchanger configurations, allows a unit footprint up to 80% smaller than ORC units. As a result, the cost per Kw is reduced accordingly.
The cycling process delivers a pressure variation that increases exponentially depending on the pre-charge and temperature differential of the siting deployment.
The charge stage to reverse the flow takes 45 seconds and occurs after the generation stage. A minimum of three other modules maintain steady power flow to the transmission/generator.
By using a non-change of state working fluid (nitrogen) we are able to reduce the footprint by up to 80% over ORC deployment. The ultra-high pressure closed loop process enables access to currently untouched geothermal resources.
An operational unit comprises a minimum of 4 modules operating in sequence delivering a steady and consistent pressure (torque) to the common driveshaft connected to the generator.
Additional modules will increase the output correspondingly to match even the largest wind turbine outputs.