Energy Reports 7 (2021) 2316–2323

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Research paper

Energy and exergy analysis of compressed air engine systems

Xuehui Zhang a , Xing Wang b , Wen Li b,c,d , Yangli Zhu b,c , Zhitao Zuo b,c,d ,
∗
Haisheng Chen b,c,d ,
a
National Energy Large Scale Physical Energy Storage Technologies R&D Center of Bijie High-tech Industrial Development Zone, Bijie, 551700, China
b
Institute of Engineering Thermophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China
c
University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, No.19(A) Yuquan Rd, Shijingshan District, Beijing 100049, China
d
Nanjing Institute of Future Energy System, IET, CAS, No. 266 Chuangyan Road, Jiangning District, Nanjing, 211135, China

article info a b s t r a c t

Article history: In the past decade, compressed air vehicles have attracted much attention because of their zero
Received 5 March 2021 pollution, high efficiency, environmental friendliness and relative maturity. To further explore the
Received in revised form 6 April 2021 potential of compressed air technology in vehicles, three-stage and four-stage compressed air engine
Accepted 16 April 2021
systems are optimized in present study by analyzing the energy and exergy distribution from a
Available online xxxx
technological viewpoint. Their characteristics are compared in terms of shaft work, coolth, overall
Keywords: efficiency, and exergy distribution. Stage expansion ratios differ under maximum work output. The
Energy analysis shaft work and coolth of both systems are increased with the increase of working pressure, turbine
Exergy inlet temperature, or stage efficiency. Three-stage compressed air engine systems have a lower work
Exergy analysis output and coolth than four-stage compressed air engine systems at given operation condition. The
Compressed air
overall efficiencies of these two systems are comparable to those of conventional diesel engines and
Engine
fuel cell vehicles. Exergy losses of the two systems are composed by the exergy loss in the turbines,
heat exchangers, and exits. The analyses suggest that increasing the number of stages, improving stage
efficiency, and utilizing coolth to reduce the exergy loss in heat exchangers are effective ways to
decrease the total exergy loss and improve the work output and overall efficiency of the compressed
air engine systems.
© 2021 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND
license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

1. Introduction Jermsittiparsert, 2021). Furthermore, a comprehensive research

Greenhouse gases (GHGs) are considered the main cause of
global warming and dramatic climate change (Javani et al., 2014;
Chitsaz et al., 2015; Akbostanc et al., 2011). One major source of
GHGs is the burning of fossil fuel in internal combustion engines
(ICE) for road transportation; hence, renewable and clean energy
technologies are quickly penetrating the automotive engine field
in response to an urgent need to reduce the amount of GHGs
released into the atmosphere (Rabinowitz, 2000a,b,c; Shen and
Hwang, 2009; Mazza and Hammerschlag, 2009).
At present, three types of new vehicle engine technologies,
which are hydrogen (Trencher, 2020; Turoń, 2020), electric bat-
tery (Chen et al., 2019) and air vehicles (Chen et al., 2011; Rama-
subramanian et al., 2021), have been proposed and investigated
extensively. As a flammable and explosive working fluid, the
hydrogen should be utilized safely in the vehicles, and the risk
control of using hydrogen raised widely concerned (Sriyakul and
∗ Corresponding author at: Institute of Engineering Thermophysics, Chinese
Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China.
E-mail address: chen_hs@mail.etp.ac.cn (H. Chen).
has been conducted by Greene (Greene et al., 2020) to find the
challenges in the designing, planning and deployment of hydro-
gen vehicles. For the electric battery vehicle, the effect of electric
vehicle promotion on reduction of particulate matter emissions
was revealed by Choi (Choi and Koo, 2021). However, due to the
environmental problems caused by waste batteries, the effect of
second use, future battery technologies, and battery lifetime on
the maximum recycled content of future electric vehicle was also
investigated (Abdelbaky et al., 2021).
Compared with the other two technologies, compressed air
vehicles have suitable efficiency, high maturity, zero pollution,
and all system components are environmentally friendly (Fang
et al., 2021). Therefore, it has been widely studied in recent
years. Vishnuvardhan (Vishnuvardhan et al., 2020) conducted a
design and experimental investigation on compressed air engine,
the results illustrated a significant improvement in engine per-
formance. Sivasubramanian (Sivasubramanian et al., 2020) also
performed design and analysis of air powered vehicle frame to
improve the reliability. The compressed-air hybrid technology
in vehicle system was also proposed to further improve the
vehicle efficiency, fuel saving and green environmental perfor-
mance (Wasbari et al., 2017). However, existing researches also

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.egyr.2021.04.025
2352-4847/© 2021 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-
nc-nd/4.0/).
X. Zhang, X. Wang, W. Li et al. Energy Reports 7 (2021) 2316–2323

illustrated that the advantages and disadvantages of compressed

air technology remain controversial (Mazza and Hammerschlag,
2009; Chen et al., 2011; Bossel, 2009; Liu and Yu, 2008; Wen et al.,
2006; Knowlen et al., 1994; Williams, 1997; Chen et al., 2009).
In order to further explore the potential of compressed air
technology in vehicles, the characteristics of compressed air en-
gine systems, including three-stage and four-stage expansion tur-
bines, are investigated in this study. Such engine systems are
then optimized in accordance with the first and second laws
of thermodynamics by analyzing the variation of energy and
exergy during the thermodynamic processes involved. Their shaft
work, coolth, overall efficiency, and exergy distribution are also
compared.

2. System description

Compressed air engine systems, namely, three-stage and four-

stage expansion turbines, are shown schematically in Figs. 1a
and 11b, respectively. High-pressure air is stored in a tank at
ambient temperature. When the system operates, compressed
air drives the first-stage turbine to work. The temperature and
pressure at the exit of the first-stage turbine are reduced due
to the enthalpy drop in the power output process. And then,
compressed air can be easily reheated to the required turbine
inlet temperature which equals to ambient temperature (293.15
K) with a heat transfer device and passes into the second-stage
turbine. Similarly, compressed air passes through the third and
fourth stages. Finally, the air is discharged to the surroundings.
Ambient pressure P0 and turbine inlet temperature T0 are 1.013
bar and 293.15 K, respectively. Storage pressure P1 of the three-
stage and four-stage compressed air engine systems is equal to Fig. 1. Schematic of compressed air engine systems.
300 bar; such storage pressure is technically safe. High pressure
is essential to provide sufficient work output for an acceptable
travel range. Compared with the four-stage compressed air en- 3. Methodology
gine system, every stage in the three-stage compressed air engine
system achieves a larger expansion ratio. 3.1. Typical thermodynamic processes of multistage compressed air
The ideal expansion process of compressed air engine systems engine systems
is isothermal because it can produce maximum shaft work. In
practice, the process in expansion engines is almost adiabatic The typical working processes of three-stage and four-stage
because compressed air passes through the expansion engine so compressed air engine systems on the temperature-entropy plane
fast that heat cannot be transferred to the compressed air; thus, (T–S diagram) are depicted in Fig. 2. In the three-stage com-
pressed air engine system, the working process consists of three
the actual expansion system is designed for multistage expansion
expansion processes (Processes 1-1’, 2-2’, and 3-3’) and two heat-
with inter-heating. In addition, efficiently obtaining an expansion
ing processes (Process 1’-2 and 2’-3) as shown in Fig. 2a. In
ratio greater than 15 in one expansion process is impossible at
Processes 1-1’, 2-2’, and 3-3’, the compressed air expands to
present. Consequently, the expansion engine of a 300 bar com- produce work adiabatically. In Processes 1’-2 and 2’-3, the com-
pressed air vehicle must have at least three stages. The number pressed air is heated at equal pressure. Process 3’-0 is carried
of stages should not be too large because increasing the number out in the atmosphere to make the temperature of the working
of stages will increase the complexity and cost of the system. media in the exit of the system return to ambient temperature.
Therefore, only three-stage and four-stage compressed air engine Process 1-0 is an ideal isothermal expansion process. The working
systems are considered in this study. process of the four-stage compressed air engine system consists
Three types of expansion engines, namely, piston expansion of four expansion processes (Processes 1-1’, 2-2’, 3-3’, and 4-
engines, screw expanders, and turbines, were investigated (Shen 4’) and three heating processes (Processes 1’-2, 2’-3, and 3’-4)
and Hwang, 2009; Chen et al., 2011; Bossel, 2009; Liu and Yu, as shown in Fig. 2b. Compared with the three-stage compressed
2008; Knowlen et al., 1994), and the results illustrated that com- air engine system, the four-stage compressed air engine system
pared to turbines, the piston expansion engines and screw ex- has one additional expansion process and one more reheating
panders present lower efficiency. At present, the maximum effi- process. Detailed analyses of the two systems are provided in the
ciency of a turbine can reach 90% when the expansion ratio of a following sections.
stage is 6.5 (Rodgers, 2003). In the following analysis, expansion
engines were regarded as a turbine type, and their efficiencies 3.2. Three-stage compressed air engine system
were assumed to be 85%, which is a common value in the litera-
The enthalpy in the compressed air tank (State 1) is h1 , and its
ture. Air was regarded as a real gas, the thermophysical parame-
exergy is provided as
ters of which were obtained from the REFPROP program (Lemmon
et al., 2010). Ex1 = h1 − h0 − T0 (S1 − S0 ) (1)
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X. Zhang, X. Wang, W. Li et al. Energy Reports 7 (2021) 2316–2323

The heat absorbed during the heating process (Process 2’-3) by

the compressed air (coolth) (Chen et al., 2011) is expressed as

Q2′ −3 = h3 − h2′ (9)

The exergy change in the heating process (Process 2’-3) is

Ex2′ −3 = Q2′ −3 − T0 (S3 − S2′ ) (10)

The expansion ratio and isentropic efficiency of the third stage
are π3 and η3 . As such, the work output and exergy loss of Process
3-3’ are
W3−3′ = h3 − h3′ = η3 W3id = η3 (h3 − h3′ id ) (11)
Ex3−3′ = Ex3 − Ex3′ − W3−3′ (12)
where h3′ id is a function of entropy S3 and pressure P3 .
The exergy in the exit of the system (State 3’) is

Ex3′ = h0 − h3′ − T0 (S0 − S3′ ) (13)

The total work output and total coolth for the three-stage
compressed air engine system are

W = W1−1′ + W2−2′ + W3−3′ (14)

Q = Q1′ −2 + Q2′ −3 (15)

3.3. Four-stage compressed air engine system

Compared with three-stage compressed air engine systems,

Fig. 2. T–S diagram of the compressed air engine systems.
The expansion ratio of the first-stage expansion process (Pro-
cess 1-1’) is π1 , and the corresponding work output and exergy
loss in the process are W1−1′ and Ex1−1′ , respectively,
four-stage compressed air engine systems have one additional
expansion process and one more heating process. With the excep-
tion of the expansion ratios of the first three stages, calculating
the work output and coolth from State 1 to State 3’ in four-stage
compressed air engine systems is not different.
The heat absorbed during the heating process (Process 3’-4) by
the compressed air (coolth) is obtained as
Q3′ −4 = h4 − h3′ (16)
The exergy change in the heating process (Process 3’-4) is

W1−1′ = h1 − h1′ = η1 W1id = η1 (h1 − h1′ id ) (2) Ex3′ −4 = Q3′ −4 − T0 (S4 − S3′ ) (17)

Ex1−1′ = Ex1 − Ex1′ − W1−1′ , (3) The expansion ratio and isentropic efficiency of the fourth stage
are π4 and η4 . As such, the work output and exergy loss of Process
where T, Ex, W, S, and h are temperature, exergy, work, entropy, 4-4’ are
and enthalpy, respectively (the subscripts represent the states in
W4−4′ = h4 − h4′ = η4 W4id = η4 (h4 − h4′ id ) (18)
Fig. 2); h1′ id is a function of entropy S1 and pressure P1 ; and η is
the isentropic efficiency of the expansion process. η is defined as Ex4−4′ = Ex4 − Ex4′ − W4−4′ (19)
the ratio of the actual work output to the isentropic work output
where h4′ id is a function of entropy S4 and pressure P4 .
as follows:
The exergy of the exit of the system (State 4’) is
Wac
η= (4) Ex4′ = h0 − h4′ − T0 (S0 − S4′ ) (20)
Wid
The heat absorbed during the heating process (Process 1’-2) by The total work output and total coolth for the four-stage
the working media from the atmosphere (coolth) is compressed air engine system are

W = W1−1′ + W2−2′ + W3−3′ + W4−4′ (21)

Q1′ −2 = h2 − h1′ (5)
Q = Q1′ −2 + Q2′ −3 + Q3′ −4 (22)
The exergy change in the heating process (Process 1’-2) is

Ex1′ −2 = Q1′ −2 − T0 (S2 − S1′ ) (6) 4. Results and discussion

The expansion ratio of the first-stage expansion process (Pro-
cess 1-1’) is π1 , and the corresponding work output and exergy
loss in the process are W1−1‘ and Ex1−1‘ , respectively:
W2−2′ = h2 − h2′ = η2 W2id = η2 (h2 − h2′ id )
Ex2−2′ = Ex2 − Ex2′ − W2−2′
where h2′ id is a function of entropy S2 and pressure P2 .
4.1. Expansion ratio
Fig. 3 shows the stage expansion ratio as a function of turbine
inlet temperature when the two systems obtain the maximum
(7) work output. The storage pressure and the final pressure are
(8) 300 bar and 1.013 bar respectively for both of the two systems.
The expansion ratios under maximum work output were ob-
tained with an in-house program written in C++ environment; the
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X. Zhang, X. Wang, W. Li et al.
Fig. 3. Expansion ratio of stages under maximum work output.
program involves the use of an exhaustion algorithm (Qing and
Xiang, 2011). Stage efficiency has no influence on the stage ex-
pansion ratio of maximum work output when the stage efficien-
cies are equal. For the range of turbine inlet temperature(240–320
K) shown in Fig. 3, the expansion ratio increases successively
from the first to the third stage, and the difference between them
gradually decreases as the turbine inlet temperature increases in
the three-stage compressed air engine system in Fig. 3a.
Fig. 3b shows that the variation regularity of expansion ratios
for the four-stage compressed air engine system is similar to
that of the three-stage compressed air engine system. If the
working media are considered as ideal gases, the expansion ratio
for different stages is similar and constant for different ambient
temperatures; thus, the variation regularity of the expansion
ratios is the result of the real thermophysical properties of air.
At the design points of the two systems (300 bar and 293.15 K),
the expansion ratios in the first stage to the third stage are 5.48,
7.00, and 7.72, respectively, for the three-stage compressed air
engine system; whereas the expansion ratios in the first stage to
the fourth stage are 3.60, 4.04, 4.45, and 4.57, respectively, for the
four-stage compressed engine system.
4.2. Shaft work
Figs. 4–6 show the work output for the two compressed air
engine systems as a function of ambient temperature, working
pressure, and efficiency at each stage, respectively.
In Fig. 4, the working pressure is 300 bar, and the stage
efficiency is 85%. For the range of turbine inlet temperature(240–
320 K) shown in the figure, the work output of the two systems
increases in a linear manner with the increase in ambient tem-
perature. When turbine inlet temperature increases to 320 K
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Energy Reports 7 (2021) 2316–2323
Fig. 4. Work output as a function of temperature.
Fig. 5. Work output as a function of pressure.
from 240 K, the work output of the three-stage and four-stage
compressed air engine systems increases by 42.4% and 41.0%,
respectively. The rates of increase for the two systems are almost
similar; however, the work output of the three-stage compressed
air engine system is lower than that of the four-stage compressed
air engine system. This difference, as shown in Fig. 3, is due to
the fact that the expansion process of the four-stage compressed
air engine system is much closer to the isothermal expansion
process.
In Fig. 5, the work output is plotted as a function of working
pressure at an turbine inlet temperature (293.15 K), and the stage
efficiency is 85%. As discussed previously, the stage expansion
ratio is directly proportional to the overall expansion ratio. The
scaling factors for the three-stage and four-stage compressed
air engine systems are the 3rd and 4th root of their ratios of
working expansion ratio to design expansion ratio, respectively.
Fig. 5 shows that the work output for the two systems increases
with the increase in working pressure over the range investigated
(280–320 bar). The work output of the three-stage compressed air
engine system is lower than that of the four-stage compressed air
engine system because of the different expansion processes.
In Fig. 6, the working pressure is 300 bar, the turbine inlet
temperature is 293.15 K, and stage efficiency is assumed to be
equal. Stage efficiency apparently has significant effects on the
work output for the three-stage and four-stage compressed air
engine systems. When efficiency increases by 40% from 60%, both
work outputs increase by approximately 66.7%. Therefore, the
efficiency at each stage is a key to increase the work outputs of
the two systems.
In summary, the work output for both compressed air engine
systems increases with the increase in ambient temperature,
X. Zhang, X. Wang, W. Li et al.
Fig. 6. Work output as a function of efficiency.
Fig. 7. Coolth available as a function of temperature.
working pressure, and efficiency. At a given ambient temperature,
pressure, or efficiency, the three-stage compressed air engine
system has a lower work output than the corresponding four-
stage compressed air engine system. For example, at 300 bar,
293.15 K, and 85% stage efficiency, the work output of a three-
stage compressed air engine system is 303.04 kJ/kg, whereas
the corresponding value for a four-stage compressed air engine
system is 326.14 kJ/kg. The work output of the three-stage com-
pressed air engine system is approximately 7% lower than that of
the four-stage compressed air engine system.
4.3. Available coolth
The thermodynamic analyses in Section 3 provide the coolth
available (heat adsorbed by working media) for the two systems.
Figs. 7–9 show that coolth increases with the increase in ambi-
ent temperature, pressure, or efficiency at each stage, which is
similar to the ambient temperature, pressure, and stage efficiency
dependence of the work output. The four-stage compressed air
engine system has more coolth than the three-stage compressed
air engine system. At 300 bar, 293.15 K, and 85% stage efficiency,
the coolth for the four-stage compressed air engine system is
281.86 kJ/kg, which is approximately 19.5% higher than that of
the three-stage compressed air engine system (235.86 kJ/kg),
because when the initial state of the two systems is similar, the
four-stage compressed air engine system has more work output;
hence, it has more coolth in accordance with the first law of
thermodynamics.
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Energy Reports 7 (2021) 2316–2323
Fig. 8. Coolth available as a function of pressure.
Fig. 9. Coolth available as a function of efficiency.
4.4. Overall efficiency
Overall efficiency is defined as the ratio of the mechanical
energy generated from the three-stage or four-stage compressed
air engine system to the energy consumed for producing com-
pressed air. However, precise estimation of overall efficiency is
difficult for compressed air engine systems because the process
of producing compressed air is unknown. A logical and eco-
nomical way of producing 300 bar compressed air is using a
multistage compression process with inter-cooling to minimize
work consumption (Turoń, 2020; Sriyakul and Jermsittiparsert,
2021). Hence, the process was assumed to be a four-stage com-
pression process with inter-cooling in this analysis, and each of
the four stages is assumed to operate at the same compression
ratio (equal to the 4th root of the total pressure ratio).
The work for a compression process is calculated by
Widi
Wi = (23)
ηi
where Widi is the isentropic compression work to achieve pres-
sure ratio πi and ηi is the isentropic efficiency. In practice, an isen-
tropic efficiency of 70%–90% is utilized for the compressor (Turoń,
2020; Liu and Yu, 2008).
The total work consumption for the compression process is
obtained as
4
∑
Wt = Wi (24)
i=1
Therefore, the overall efficiency is obtained:
W
ηOverall = (25)
Wt
X. Zhang, X. Wang, W. Li et al. Energy Reports 7 (2021) 2316–2323

Table 1
Overall efficiency of the two systems.
Three-stage compressed air engine system Four-stage compressed air engine system
Compressor efficiency ηi = 70% ηi = 90% ηi = 70% ηi = 90%
Total energy in 859.31 kJ/kg 668.35 kJ/kg 859.31 kJ/kg 668.35 kJ/kg
Work output (η = 85%) 303.04 kJ/kg 303.04 kJ/kg 326.14 kJ/kg 326.14 kJ/kg
Work output (η = 90%) 320.86 kJ/kg 320.86 kJ/kg 345.33 kJ/kg 345.33 kJ/kg
Overall efficiency (η = 85%) 35.27% 45.34% 37.95% 48.80%
Overall efficiency (η = 90%) 37.34% 48.01% 40.19% 51.67%

Table 2
Distribution of exergy for the two systems.
Three-stage compressed air engine system Four-stage compressed air engine system
Exergy (kJ/kg) Percentage in total exergy (%) Exergy (kJ/kg) Percentage in total exergy (%)
Exergy in
State 1 479.23 100 479.23 100
Exergy loss
Expansion process 1-1’ 25.20 5.26 18.37 3.83
Heating process 1’-2 29.52 6.16 17.66 3.69
Expansion process 2-2’ 30.62 6.39 20.36 4.25
Heating process 2’-3 29.12 6.08 17.31 3.61
Expansion process 3-3’ 33.05 6.89 22.46 4.69
Heating process 3’-3 – – 16.98 3.54
Expansion process 4-4’ – – 23.09 4.82
Leaving exergy loss 28.69 5.99 16.86 3.51
Total 176.20 36.77 153.09 31.94
Exergy available
Expansion process 1-1’ 89.99 18.78 73.79 15.40
Expansion process 2-2’ 102.94 21.48 78.63 16.41
Expansion process 3-3’ 110.10 22.97 85.77 17.90
Expansion process 4-4’ – – 87.95 18.35
Total 303.04 63.23 326.14 68.06
Exergy available + exergy loss
479.23 100 479.23 100

where Wt is the total work consumption for the four-stage com-
pression process which can be calculated by:
4 4
∑ ∑ Widi
Wt = Wi =
ηi
i=1 i=1
where Widi is the isentropic compression work to achieve pres-
sure ratio π i and η i is the isentropic efficiency. In practice,
an isentropic efficiency of 70%–90% is utilized for the compres-
sor (Mazza and Hammerschlag, 2009; Wu, 2012).
The W in Eq. (25) is the mechanical energy generated from the
three-stage or four-stage compressed air engine system. When a
three-stage compressed air engine system is adopted, the W is
calculated by Eq. (14). When a four-stage compressed air engine
system is employed, the W is calculated by Eq. (21).
Table 1 shows the overall efficiencies of the two systems at
300 bar of storage pressure and 293.15 K of inlet temperature
of turbine. The overall efficiencies of the two systems are in
the range of 35.27%–51.67%. They are comparable to those of
conventional diesel engines and fuel cell vehicles, which are
approximately 21% and 34%, respectively (Mazza and Hammer-
schlag, 2009; Kreeith et al., 2002). The overall efficiency of the
four-stage compressed air engine system is higher than that of
the three-stage compressed air engine system. Table 1 shows that
overall efficiency can be improved in two ways; one is to reduce
the work consumed by the producing compressed air, and the
other is to optimize the compressed air engine systems to obtain
more available energy.
4.5. Exergy distribution
The exergy of compressed air is the maximum energy avail-
able when the state of compressed air is changed to that of its
(26) environment. Table 2 presents the distribution of exergy for the
two systems at 300 bar of storage pressure, 293.15 K of inlet
temperature, and 85% of stage efficiency. Exergy is equal to the
sum of exergy loss and exergy available in accordance with the
second law of thermodynamics. The exergy loss for the two sys-
tems consists of three components, which are exergy loss in the
turbines, heat exchangers, and exits. Compared with the three-
stage compressed air engine system, the four-stage compressed
air engine system has lower exergy loss in the turbines, heat ex-
changers, and the exit. Its total exergy loss is approximately 4.83%
lower than that of the three-stage compressed air engine system,
which is an essential reason why the four-stage compressed air
engine system has a larger work output.
Figs. 10 and 11 show the exergy distributions at different
stage efficiencies for the three-stage and four-stage compressed
air engine systems. Storage pressure is assumed to be 300 bar,
and turbine inlet temperature is 293.15 K. The exergy loss in
the turbines decreases as the stage efficiency increases, but the
exergy loss in the heat exchangers and exit for both systems are
increased with the increment of the stage efficiency. When stage
efficiency increases to 90% from 85%, the total exergy loss of the
three-stage compressed air engine system is decreased by 3.72%,
whereas the total exergy loss for the four-stage compressed air
engine is reduced by 4%.
The above results show that an increment in available ex-
ergy can decrease the total exergy loss of the system. Therefore,
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Fig. 10. Distribution of exergy for the three-stage compressed air engine system.

Fig. 11. Distribution of exergy for the four-stage compressed air engine system.

increasing the number of stages to decrease all three types of
exergy loss, improving the efficiency at each stage to reduce
exergy loss in the turbines, and utilizing coolth to decrease exergy
loss in the heat exchangers can be adopted.
5. Conclusions
and the exits of the two systems. The analysis suggests that
increasing the number of stages, improving the efficiency at each
stage, and utilizing coolth to reduce exergy loss in the heat
exchangers are effective means for decreasing the total exergy
loss and improving the work output and overall efficiency of
compressed air engine systems.

In present study, thermodynamic analysis for compressed air

engine systems was conducted from a technological viewpoint. CRediT authorship contribution statement
The stage expansion ratios for maximum work output were ob-
tained for three-stage and four-stage compressed air engine sys- Xuehui Zhang: Conceptualization, Writing - original draft,
tems. The energy and exergy of the two systems were analyzed Formal analysis. Xing Wang: Writing - review & editing. Wen Li:
and compared in terms of shaft work, coolth, overall efficiency,
Investigation. Yangli Zhu: Validation. Zhitao Zuo: Data curation.
and exergy distribution. Some conclusions are obtained:
Haisheng Chen: Supervision.
(1) The expansion ratio of the first stage is the smallest, and
those of the following stages gradually increase; the difference
between them decreases as the turbine inlet temperature in- Declaration of competing interest
creases. The shaft work and coolth of both systems increase
as working pressure, ambient temperature, or stage efficiency
The authors declare that they have no known competing finan-
increases.
cial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared
(2) Given its working pressure, ambient temperature, and
to influence the work reported in this paper.
stage efficiency, the three-stage compressed air engine system
has a lower work output and coolth than the four-stage com-
pressed air engine system. When storage pressure, turbine inlet Acknowledgments
temperature and stage efficiency are 300 bar, 293.15 K and 85%,
the shaft work and coolth of the three-stage compressed air
engine system are 303.04 kJ/kg and 235.86 kJ/kg, respectively, The authors are grateful for the financial support provided by
whereas the corresponding values for the four-stage compressed National Science Fund for Distinguished Young Scholars
air engine system are 326.14 kJ/kg and 281.86 kJ/kg. The overall (51925604), National Natural Science Foundation of China
efficiencies of the two systems are in the range of 35.27%–51.67% (51806211), Science and Technology Foundation of Guizhou
and are comparable to those of conventional diesel engines and Province (No. [2017]1164), International Partnership Program,
fuel cell vehicles. Bureau of International Cooperation of Chinese Academy of Sci-
(3) Exergy analysis shows that the exergy loss for the two ences (182211KYSB20170029), and Beijing Key Laboratory of
systems consists of exergy loss in the turbines, heat exchangers, Distributed Combined Cooling Heating and Power System.
2322
X. Zhang, X. Wang, W. Li et al.
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