2024 Faculty Courses School of Engineering Undergraduate major in Mechanical Engineering
Energy Conversion
- Academic unit or major
- Undergraduate major in Mechanical Engineering
- Instructor(s)
- Kazuyoshi Fushinobu / Shuichiro Hirai / Hidenori Kosaka / Yoshihiro Okuno / Hideharu Takahashi
- Class Format
- Lecture/Exercise (Face-to-face)
- Media-enhanced courses
- -
- Day of week/Period
(Classrooms) - 1-4 Tue
- Class
- -
- Course Code
- MEC.E331
- Number of credits
- 1.50.50
- Course offered
- 2024
- Offered quarter
- 4Q
- Syllabus updated
- Mar 14, 2025
- Language
- Japanese
Syllabus
Course overview and goals
This course provides wide variety of current energy conversion technology by lecturing the items such as following:
1. chemical reaction, electochemical reaction and combustion fundamentals with energy conversion
2. internal combustion engine
3. fuel cell and secondary battery
4. CO2 sequestration technology
5. nuclear energy
6. high efficiency electric power generation systems with low environmental load
7. cogeneration systems
8. renewable energy.
Modern mechanical engineers need to deal with variety of energy conversion technology and to go back to the basics of the conversion principles in order to become the game changers. This course aims at the students to obtain fundamental basics to tackle with the global environmental and energy problems - the common issues for the human beings - by understanding the principles and by learning the up-to-date applications, opportunities and challenges.
Course description and aims
1. To understand the fundamentals of chemical reaction, electrochemical reaction and combustion
2. To conduct fundamental calculations of energy conversion by means of chemical reaction, electrochemical reaction and combustion
3. To understand the fundamentals of internal combustion engine, fuel cell and secondary battery, CO2 sequestration technology, nuclear energy, high efficiency electric power generation systems with low environmental load, cogeneration systems, and renewable energy.
This class aims at obtaining the learning goals of 6 and 7 in the ME course guide.
Keywords
Energy conversion, Combustion, Chemical reaction, Electrochemical reaction, Internal combustion engine, High efficiency electric power generation technology with low environmental load, Fuel cells, Secondary batteries, Cogeneration systems, Renewable energy, Nuclear energy, CO2 sequestration technology
Competencies
- Specialist skills
- Intercultural skills
- Communication skills
- Critical thinking skills
- Practical and/or problem-solving skills
- This class aims at learning 6 and 7 of learning objective.
Class flow
The course mainly consists of lectures, and exercise problems shall be provided along with each topic.
Course schedule/Objectives
| Course schedule | Objectives | |
|---|---|---|
| Class 1 | Introduction (On the energy conversion) | To understand the importance of energy conversion on the environmental protection and efficient use of energy |
| Class 2 | Chemical energy, enthalpy, and Gibbs free energy | To understand the chemical energy and its relationship among other form of energy from thermodynamics |
| Class 3 | Chemical reaction | To understand the basics of chemical reactions, such as combustion or reforming |
| Class 4 | Heat of reaction and adiabatic flame temperature | To understand and calculate the heat of reaction and adiabatic flame temperature |
| Class 5 | Chemical equilibrium and hydrogen production | To understand chemical equilibrium, hydrogen production, and hydrogen-based efficient energy utilization |
| Class 6 | Internal combustion engine (Reciprocating engine) | To understand the various cycles and the control of reciprocating engine |
| Class 7 | Internal combustion engine (Gas turbine) | To understand the cycles and basic principles of gas turbine |
| Class 8 | Electrochemical reaction | To understand the chemical reaction associated with the electron transfer in electrochemical cells |
| Class 9 | Fuel cell and secondary battery | To understand the chemical to electrical energy conversion and the fundamentals and applications of electric power storage |
| Class 10 | CO2 sequestration technology | To understand the underground CO2 sequestration and enhanced oil recovery technology |
| Class 11 | Nuclear energy | To understand the basics of nuclear energy and nuclear power generation |
| Class 12 | High efficiency electric power generation systems with low environmental load | To understand the high efficiency electric power generation systems, such as combined cycles and coal gasification power plant |
| Class 13 | Cogeneration systems, Renewable energy | To understand the mechanism and control of heat and work cogeneration systems, and the basics and the present of solar, wind and biomass energy |
| Class 14 | Review session on energy conversion | Comprehensive understanding of the energy conversion technology |
Study advice (preparation and review)
To enhance effective learning, students are encouraged to spend approximately 100 minutes preparing for class and another 100 minutes reviewing class content afterwards (including assignments) for each class.
They should do so by referring to textbooks and other course material.
Textbook(s)
Relevant materials shall be provided in classroom if necessary
Reference books, course materials, etc.
JSME Textbook Series, "Thermodynamics", The Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers (in Japanese)
Evaluation methods and criteria
Knowledge and understanding of each lecture items shall be evaluated. Quizzes in lectures, exercise problems, reports and the achievement of the Review session will be weighted by the number of lecture weeks. Details of the Review session will be announced in lectures in each academic year.
Related courses
- None
Prerequisites
Students must have successfully completed Thermodynamics (Mechanical Engineering) (MEC.E201.R), Heat Transfer (MEC.E311.A), Fundamentals of Fluid Mechanics (MEC.F201.R), and Practical Fluid Mechanics (MEC.F211.A) or have equivalent knowledge, understanding and skills. Students who enrolled on or after April 1, 2023 (23B~) are not eligible to take this course in FY2024.