Improving Heat-Engine Performance by Employing Multiple Heat Reservoirs

The efficiencies of heat-engine operation employing various numbers (>= 2) of heat reservoirs are investigated. Operation with the work output of the heat engines sequestered, as well as with it being totally frictionally dissipated, is discussed. We consider mainly heat engines whose efficiencies depend on ratios of a higher and lower temperature or on simple functions of such ratios but also provide brief comments concerning more general cases. We show that, if a hot reservoir supplies a heat engine whose waste heat is discharged and whose work output is totally frictionally dissipated into a cooler reservoir, which in turn supplies heat-engine operation that discharges waste heat into a still cooler reservoir, the total work output can exceed the heat input from the initial hot reservoir. This extra work output increases with increasing numbers (>= 3) of reservoirs. We also show that this obtains within the restrictions of the First and Second Laws of Thermodynamics.