Design and Development of Radial Turbine for a Helium Liquefier

Abstract

Though the demand of liquefied gas is increasing day by day in every field, from medical sector to large steel plant, the future of this industry does not seem to see luster in India. We don‟t have indigenous technology in this field. Recently, as India is focusing in the developing technology indigenously, an initiative is also taken by NIT Rourkela to build a full scale liquefaction plant, first time in India, itself. All the parts of it are being developed by Prof. Suraj Kr. Behera, Prof. R.K. Sahoo and their fellow students with or without the help of local establishment indigenously. The main objective of this is to make expertise next gen or Indian firms in the field of cryogenics.
The duration of first phase of the project is three year where we are going to specify a roadmap of the plant and development /modification of each and every component. Several areas are already covered. We are assigned to a work, related to turbo expander. Extensive numerical, experimental and software analysis has been done and we are going to continue it till our completion of degree or after finishing, if required.
Turbo expander is an important part of a liquefaction plant which operates on Claude, Kapitza or Collins cycle. It actually cools down a fraction of working fluid (air) by expanding it isoentopically and feed it to downstream. Such that consecutive heat transfer through HX precools the upstream going to expand in J-T valve. Turbo expander consists of few components, this are – 1) Turbine 2) Brake Compressor 3) Diffuser and nozzles 4) Aerostatic and Aerodynamic bearing 5) Measuring instruments. We are going to conduct numerical analysis, blade profiling for turbine and compressor, solid modeling, fluent analysis and match this results with our requirement with this results, if unsatisfied then modify the current design for greater efficiency, output, service life and reduced cost of project.