Words to intruduce things
Industrial Heat
Example 1: Natural Gas
Potential market (mid 2025) for NEW combined cycle installations at existing Natural Gas plants in North America;
i.e a market where CPE’s engine could improve efficiencies significantly
Key Take aways:
Across North America,approximately 200–250 GW of natural‑gas generation capacity remains as simple‑cycle or steam‑only.
This represents hundreds of existing power plants that could potentially upgrade to combined‑cycle using CPE’s engine system to improve efficiency.
The bulk is in the U.S. (~130 GW), followed by Mexico (~52 GW), and a smaller share in Canada (~10–20 GW).
Summary
| Country | Nat‑gas capacity
(approx) |
Combined‑cycle
(share) |
Non‑CC share
(approx) |
Retrofit candidates
(capacity) |
| U.S. | ~490 GW | ~280 GW (57 %) | ~130–140 GW | ~130–140 GW
(hundreds of plants) |
| Mexico | ~86 GW | ~33 GW (39 %) | ~52 GW | ~52 GW
(tens‑hundreds of plants) |
| Canada | ~20–40 GW† | ~? (unknown, assume ~50 %) | ~10–20 GW | ~10–20 GW
(dozens of plants) |
† Canada’s exact gas‑fired capacity is unknown but is significantly less than the U.S. or Mexico.
The Breakdowns:
🇺🇸 United States
- Total natural gas generating capacity is approximately 490–500 GW, of which about 280 GW (~57 %) is already combined‑cycle Wikipedia+8AJOT+8JD Supra+8;
- Thus, approximately 130–140 GW (≈26–28 %) of capacity is simple‑cycle combustion turbine or steam‑only units, which could potentially be converted to combined‑cycle with CPE’s engine Fortune Business InsightsPower Engineering.
- Importantly: there are ~ 557 existing combined‑cycle plants in operation in the U.S. (~292 GW), meaning the rest of the gas plants, likely several hundred units, are simple‑cycle that could be CPE engine upgrade candidates LinkedIn.
estimate: ~130 GW of existing simple‑cycle capacity across several hundred plants in the U.S. could be retrofitted.
🇲🇽 Mexico
- As of 2021, total generation capacity was about 86 GW, with ~39 % being combined‑cycle units (~33 GW), the rest (~61 %) being simple‑cycle, older steam, or dual‑fuel peakers Reddit+13Reddit+13Reddit+13energycentral.com+3eia.gov+3AJOT+3.
- That equates to around 52 GW of capacity that is not yet combined‑cycle and could plausibly adopt CPE’s technology.
🇨🇦 Canada
- No exact breakdown is publicly cited, but Canada’s natural‑gas fleet is much smaller. Several big combined‑cycle plants (like Greenfield in Ontario with ~1,000 MW) are known Wikipedia. But many provincial power systems still include steam‑only or simple‑cycle gas turbines, particularly for peaking or legacy capacity;
- assuming Canada has ~ 20–40 GW of gas‑fired capacity nationwide and that 40–50% is non‑combined then ~10–20 GW may be available for retrofit.
TBD:
- EU;
- Asia
- Rest of World
Caveats & Notes
- Feasibility depends on plant type: Not all simple‑cycle turbines are practical to retrofit (e.g., mobile peakers, very small units, or ones slated for retirement);
- Efficiency gate: Your hydraulic Stirling bottomer (15 % efficiency at ~79 °C) resembles a low‑grade bottoming cycle; this is analogous to adding a heat recovery steam generator (HRSG) + steam turbine—but at lower inlet temperature. It might only boost output modestly compared to full conventional combined‑cycle efficiency (~50 %);
- Economic/regulatory considerations: Many simple‑cycle plants are older peakers used only during peak demand; retrofitting may not make economic sense if run‑hours are low. Also environmental regulations, retrofit costs, grid permitting and alternative upgrades (e.g. batteries, renewables) may be factors.
Example 2: fred
Geothermal
Geothermal 1
direct low temp – ala the DC’s
Geothermal 2
combined cycle with high T geothermal