Heat Pump

• A “heat pump” is defined as a device that transfers heat from a low-temperature source to a high-temperature one. Ex: a heat pump to extract energy from outside cold outdoor air into the warm indoors.

Heat pump

QH

QL

TH

TL

Wnet

• Coefficient of Performance (COP): COP=QH/Wnet=QH/(QH-QL)

= 1/(1-QL/QH)

• COPɭ, ex: a typical heat pump has a COP in the order of 3

• Question: can we built a heat pump operating at ?, that is Wnet=0? QH=QL?

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