Consider the open cycle of the regenerator gas-turbine power-plant indicated in
Figs. 1 and2. There are four components, the air compressor, the regenerator, the
combustion chamber andthe gas turbine. The feature of flow through each component
is that there is a pressure drop that increases with the flow rate. The key of this
study is to determining the optimal flow-rate (or optimal pressure-drops) that allows
the power plant to operate at maximum power output. Similar studies for simple
fluid-flow power converters were performed by Bejan [32–34] andChen et al. [35,36].
Proceeding along the path followed by the working fluid, the following modeling
assumptions are made: