Thermodynamics is the physics of heat. Practical applications of thermodynamics include temperature regulation of electronics, heating and air conditioning, automobile engine design, weather prediction, and anywhere else where heat is exchanged.
Why doesn’t there exist a car that gets over a 100 miles/gallon? Have the big oil companies been suppressing the patents for this technology in order to suppress the building of such efficient engines? Let’s look at the physics behind these ideas (Figure 11.1).
FIGURE 11.1 A cooling tower exchanging heat with the environment.
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