Chapter 6: The Second Law of Thermodynamics

1. A 600-MW steam power plant, which is cooled by a nearby river, has a thermal efficiency of
40 percent. Determine the rate of heat transfer to the river water. Will the actual heat
transfer rate be higher or lower than this value? Why?

2. A steam power plant receives heat from a furnace at a rate of 280 GJ/h. Heat losses to the
surrounding air from the steam as it passes through the pipes and other components are
estimated to be about 8 GJ/h. If the waste heat is transferred to the cooling water at a
rate of 145 GJ/h, determine (a) net power output and (b) the thermal efficiency of this
power plant. Answers: (a) 35.3 MW, (b) 45.4 percent

3. A steam power plant with a power output of 150 MW consumes coal at a rate of 60 tons/h.
If the heating value of the coal is 30,000 kJ/kg, determine the overall efficiency of this
plant. Answer: 30.0 percent

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4. An automobile engine consumes fuel at a rate of 28 L/h and delivers 60 kW of power to the
wheels. If the fuel has a heating value of 44,000 kJ/kg and a density of 0.8 g/cm3,
determine the efficiency of this engine. Answer: 21.9 percent

5. In 2001, the United States produced 51 percent of its electricity in the amount of 1.878
x1012 kWh from coal-fired power plants. Taking the average thermal efficiency to be 34
percent, determine the amount of thermal energy rejected by the coal-fired power plants in
the United States that year.

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6. Determine the COP of a refrigerator that removes heat from the food compartment at a
rate of 5040 kJ/h for each kW of power it consumes. Also, determine the rate of heat
rejection to the outside air.

7. Determine the COP of a heat pump that supplies energy to a house at a rate of 800 kJ/h for
each kW of electric power it draws. Also, determine the rate of energy absorption from the
outdoor air. Answers: 2.22, 4400 kJ/h

8. A house that was heated by electric resistance heaters consumed 1200 kWh of electric
energy in a winter month. If this house were heated instead by a heat pump that has an
average COP of 2.4, determine how much money the home owner would have saved that
month. Assume a price of 8.5¢/kWh for electricity.

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9. A heat pump used to heat a house runs about one-third of the time. The house is losing heat
at an average rate of 22,000 kJ/h. If the COP of the heat pump is 2.8, determine the power
the heat pump draws when running.

10. A heat pump is used to maintain a house at a constant temperature of 23°C. The house is
losing heat to the outside air through the walls and the windows at a rate of 60,000 kJ/h
while the energy generated within the house from people, lights, and appliances amounts to
4000 kJ/h. For a COP of 2.5, determine the required power input to the heat pump.
Answer: 6.22 kW

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11. Refrigerant-134a enters the condenser of a residential heat pump at 800 kPa and 35°C at a
rate of 0.018 kg/s and leaves at 800 kPa as a saturated liquid. If the compressor consumes
1.2 kW of power, determine (a) the COP of the heat pump and (b) the rate of heat
absorption from the outside air.

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12. Refrigerant-134a enters the evaporator coils placed at the back of the freezer section of a
household refrigerator at 120 kPa with a quality of 20 percent and leaves at 120 kPa and -
20°C. If the compressor consumes 450 W of power and the COP the refrigerator is 1.2,
determine (a) the mass flow rate of the refrigerant and (b) the rate of heat rejected to
the kitchen air. Answers: (a) 0.00311 kg/s, (b) 990 W

13. In tropical climates, the water near the surface of the ocean remains warm throughout the
year as a result of solar energy absorption. In the deeper parts of the ocean, however, the
water remains at a relatively low temperature since the sun’s rays cannot penetrate very
far. It is proposed to take advantage of this temperature difference and construct a power
plant that will absorb heat from the warm water near the surface and reject the waste heat
to the cold water a few hundred meters below. Determine the maximum thermal efficiency
of such a plant if the water temperatures at the two respective locations are 24 and 3°C.

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14. An innovative way of power generation involves the utilization of geothermal energy the
energy of hot water that exists naturally underground as the heat source. If a supply of hot
water at 140°C is discovered at a location where the environmental temperature is 20°C,
determine the maximum thermal efficiency a geothermal power plant built at that location
can have. Answer: 29.1 percent

15. An inventor claims to have developed a heat engine that receives 700 kJ of heat from a
source at 500 K and produces 300 kJ of net work while rejecting the waste heat to a sink at
290 K. Is this a reasonable claim? Why?

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16. An air-conditioning system operating on the reversed Carnot cycle is required to transfer
heat from a house at a rate of 750 kJ/min to maintain its temperature at 24°C. If the
outdoor air temperature is 35°C, determine the power required to operate this air-
conditioning system. Answer: 0.46 kW

17. A Carnot refrigerator operates in a room in which the temperature is 25°C. The
refrigerator consumes 500 W of power when operating and has a COP of 4.5. Determine (a)
the rate of heat removal from the refrigerated space and (b) the temperature of the
refrigerated space. Answers: (a) 135 kJ/min, (b) _29.2°C

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18. An inventor claims to have developed a refrigeration system that removes heat from the
closed region at -12°C and transfers it to the surrounding air at 25°C while maintaining a
COP of 6.5. Is this claim reasonable? Why?

19. During an experiment conducted in a room at 25°C, a laboratory assistant measures that a
refrigerator that draws 2 kW of power has removed 30,000 kJ of heat from the
refrigerated space, which is maintained at -30°C. The running time of the refrigerator
during the experiment was 20 min. Determine if these measurements are reasonable.

20. The label on a washing machine indicates that the washer will use $85 worth of hot water if
the water is heated by a 90 percent efficient electric heater at an electricity rate of
$0.09/kWh. If the water is heated from 15 to 55°C, the amount of hot water an average
family uses per year is
(a) 10.5 tons (b) 20.3 tons (c) 18.3 tons (d) 22.6 tons (e) 24.8 tons

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21. A 2.4-m high 200-m2 house is maintained at 22°C by an air-conditioning system whose COP
is 3.2. It is estimated that the kitchen, bath, and other ventilating fans of the house
discharge a houseful of conditioned air once every hour. If the average outdoor
temperature is 32°C, the density of air is 1.20 kg/m3, and the unit cost of electricity is
$0.10/kWh, the amount of money “vented out” by the fans in 10 hours is
(a) $0.50 (b) $1.60 (c) $5.00 (d) $11.00 (e) $16.00

22. The drinking water needs of an office are met by cooling tab water in a refrigerated water
fountain from 23 to 6°C at an average rate of 10 kg/h. If the COP of this refrigerator is
3.1, the required power input to this refrigerator is
(a) 197 W (b) 612 W (c) 64 W (d) 109 W (e) 403 W

23. A heat pump is absorbing heat from the cold outdoors at 5°C and supplying heat to a house
at 22°C at a rate of 18,000 kJ/h. If the power consumed by the heat pump is 2.5 kW, the
coefficient of performance of the heat pump is
(a) 0.5 (b) 1.0 (c) 2.0 (d) 5.0 (e) 17.3

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24. A heat engine cycle is executed with steam in the saturation dome. The pressure of steam is
1 MPa during heat addition, and 0.4 MPa during heat rejection. The highest possible
efficiency of this heat engine is
(a) 8.0% (b) 15.6% (c) 20.2% (d) 79.8% (e) 100%

25. A heat engine receives heat from a source at 1000°C and rejects the waste heat to a sink at
50°C. If heat is supplied to this engine at a rate of 100 kJ/s, the maximum power this heat
engine can produce is
(a) 25.4 kW (b) 55.4 kW (c) 74.6 kW (d) 95.0 kW (e) 100.0 kW

26. A heat pump cycle is executed with R–134a under the saturation dome between the pressure
limits of 1.8 and 0.2 MPa. The maximum coefficient of performance of this heat pump is
(a) 1.1 (b) 3.6 (c) 5.0 (d) 4.6 (e) 2.6

27. A refrigeration cycle is executed with R-134a under the saturation dome between the
pressure limits of 1.6 and 0.2 MPa. If the power consumption of the refrigerator is 3 kW,
the maximum rate of heat removal from the cooled space of this refrigerator is
(a) 0.45 kJ/s (b) 0.78 kJ/s (c) 3.0 kJ/s (d) 11.6 kJ/s (e) 14.6 kJ/s

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28. A heat pump with a COP of 3.2 is used to heat a perfectly sealed house (no air leaks). The
entire mass within the house (air, furniture, etc.) is equivalent to 1200 kg of air. When
running, the heat pump consumes electric power at a rate of 5 kW. The temperature of the
house was 7°C when the heat pump was turned on. If heat transfer through the envelope of
the house (walls, roof, etc.) is negligible, the length of time the heat pump must run to raise
the temperature of the entire contents of the house to 22°C is
(a) 13.5 min (b) 43.1 min (c) 138 min (d) 18.8 min (e) 808 min

29. A heat engine cycle is executed with steam in the saturation dome between the pressure
limits of 5 and 2 MPa. If heat is supplied to the heat engine at a rate of 380 kJ/s, the
maximum power output of this heat engine is
(a) 36.5 kW (b) 74.2 kW (c) 186.2 kW (d) 343.5 kW (e) 380.0 kW

30. An air-conditioning system operating on the reversed Carnot cycle is required to remove
heat from the house at a rate of 32 kJ/s to maintain its temperature constant at 20°C. If
the temperature of the outdoors is 35°C, the power required to operate this air-
conditioning system is
(a) 0.58 kW (b) 3.20 kW (c) 1.56 kW (d) 2.26 kW (e) 1.64 kW

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31. A refrigerator is removing heat from a cold medium at 3°C at a rate of 7200 kJ/h and
rejecting the waste heat to a medium at 30°C. If the coefficient of performance of the
refrigerator is 2, the power consumed by the refrigerator is
(a) 0.1 kW (b) 0.5 kW (c) 1.0 kW (d) 2.0 kW (e) 5.0 kW

32. Two Carnot heat engines are operating in series such that the heat sink of the first engine
serves as the heat source of the second one. If the source temperature of the first engine
is 1600 K and the sink temperature of the second engine is 300 K and the thermal
efficiencies of both engines are the same, the temperature of the intermediate reservoir is
(a) 950 K (b) 693 K (c) 860 K (d) 473 K (e) 758 K

33. Consider a Carnot refrigerator and a Carnot heat pump operating between the same two
thermal energy reservoirs. If the COP of the refrigerator is 3.4, the COP of the heat pump
is
(a) 1.7 (b) 2.4 (c) 3.4 (d) 4.4 (e) 5.0

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34. A typical new household refrigerator consumes about 680 kWh of electricity per year and
has a coefficient of performance of 1.4. The amount of heat removed by this refrigerator
from the refrigerated space per year is
(a) 952 MJ/yr (b) 1749 MJ/yr (c) 2448 MJ/yr (d) 3427 MJ/yr (e) 4048 MJ/yr

35. A window air conditioner that consumes 1 kW of electricity when running and has a
coefficient of performance of 4 is placed in the middle of a room, and is plugged in. The
rate of cooling or heating this air conditioner will provide to the air in the room when
running is
(a) 4 kJ/s, cooling (b) 1 kJ/s, cooling (c) 0.25 kJ/s, heating
(d) 1 kJ/s, heating (e) 4 kJ/s, heating

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