Comments

The process needs to run at a certain temperature, normally higher than ambient. To maintain this temp energy must be put into the system. Look at your enthropy laws: The first statement of the 2nd law of thermodynamics is that heat flows spontaneously from a hot to a cold body. So the heat necessary to make electricity is flowing from the source to the atmosphere and it must be replaced to keep the process moving. Again, the energy savings from properly insulating the process to hold the heat loss in would be much more than using that same heat in a process that is less than 100% efficient to generate electricity. Now there is the case where true waste heat would be available, like cement off the kiln or the cooling of AL or steel after processing or the heat generated in a landfill from decomposition or the condensing steam heat off a power plant that might be a candidate for a device like this. Channeling/concentrating that heat might be a challenge. But the investment on $128K and all the peripheral equipment and maintenance costs vs the low level of KW this will produce will have an ROI of decades, not years. The user would be better off directly using this heat in a secondary process. I ask what the thermal efficiency of this beast is? How many thermal KW in vs electrical KW out? I'll bet it is pretty low. Sure, it is "green" to say we will recover this energy, but it will cost you more energy & carbon to get it than it will ever replace. Kinda like the tree huggers travelling across the country to protest wasting energy! I still say these things come up every few years, like Freon 113 for transformers or room-temperature superconductivity, grab a few suckers to buy them, and then just as fast they disappear leaving the unsuspecting with a boat anchor. Oh, and the disposal cost in $$ and carbon. If this is still around when I retire in a little over 10 years, look me up and I'll buy the beer!