TY - JOUR TI - Thermodynamic analysis of air refrigerator on exergy graph AU - Nikulshin Vladimir AU - Bailey Margaret AU - Nikulshina Viktoria JN - Thermal Science PY - 2006 VL - 10 IS - 1 SP - 99 EP - 110 PT - Article AB - Improving mechanical system efficiency is the goal of many engineers and scientists. Commonly, the solutions to these types of problems are uncovered using thermodynamic analysis and optimization. An innovative method for the thermodynamic analysis of a complex energy-intensive system with an arbitrary structure is described in this paper. The method is based on a novel general equation to calculate the total system exergy efficiency using an exergy flow graph proposed by the authors. Discuss in this paper exergy efficiency and exergy loss models as well this approach allows a user to obtain not only the exergy losses and efficiency of the total system, but also to show the relationship between the exergy efficiency of an individual element and that of the entire system. An example is provided that employs this method to the thermodynamic analysis of an air refrigerator.