Title: Optimisation of energy and exergy of turbofan engines using genetic algorithms

Authors: Vin Cent Tai; Phen Chiak See; Cristinel Mares

Addresses: Department of Electric Power Engineering, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, No. 7491 Trondheim, Norway ' Department of Electric Power Engineering, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, No. 7491 Trondheim, Norway ' School of Engineering and Design, Brunel University, Middlesex UBH 3PH, UK

Abstract: This paper presents an application of genetic algorithm (GA) metaheuristics to optimise the design of two-spool separated-flow turbofan engines based on energy and exergy laws. The GA was used to seek the optimum values of eight parameters that defined the turbofan engine. A computer program called the TurboJet-Engine Optimiser v1.0 (TJEO-1.0) has been developed to perform thermodynamic property calculations of the engine and implement the optimisations. The TJEO-1.0 was integrated with Pyevolve, an open source GA optimisation framework built for use with Python programming language. The optimum designs created by TJEO-1.0 were evaluated with the following criteria: 1) energy efficiency; 2) exergy efficiency; 3) combination of both of them. Compared with the designs optimised for maximum energy efficiency, the designs optimised with the combination of energy and exergy efficiencies were able to produce 3.3%-11.0% extra specific thrust at the expense of 1.5%-2.3% extra fuel consumption.

Keywords: global optimisation; exergy efficiency; energy efficiency; genetic algorithms; aircraft engines; turbofan engines; thermodynamics; thrust; fuel consumption.

DOI: 10.1504/IJSA.2014.062866

International Journal of Sustainable Aviation, 2014 Vol.1 No.1, pp.25 - 42

Received: 02 Mar 2013
Accepted: 05 Apr 2013
Published online: 19 Jul 2014 *

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