COMBINED CYCLE POWER PLANT

摘要

Combined cycle power plants and related methods are disclosed here. In the plants, a mediating thermal energy storage unit (18) is used to store waste or residual thermal energy recovered from a heat engine employing a top thermodynamic cycle (10) of the combined cycle power plant, so that the stored residual thermal energy may be used as an energy source in a bottom thermodynamic cycle (11) of the power plant. In the combined cycle power plants described here, the heat engine employing a top cycle may comprise a Brayton cycle heat engine and the heat engine employing the bottom thermodynamic cycle may be a Rankine cycle heat engine.