What's The Steam Turbine?

A steam turbine is a device that extracts thermal energy from pressurized steam and uses it to do mechanical work on a rotating output shaft. Its modern manifestation was invented by Sir Charles Parsons in1884.

Because the turbine generates rotary motion, it is particularly suited to be used to drive an electrical generator – about90% of all electricity generation in the United States (1996) is by use of steam turbines. The steam turbine is a form of heat engine that derives much of its improvement in thermodynamic efficiency from the use of multiple stages in the expansion of the steam, which results in a closer approach to the ideal reversible expansion process.

A steam turbine uses steam to drive a generator, which then produces electricity. Learn about the development and uses for steam turbines.

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It is an engine. A steam turbine is a heat engine that uses the expansion of steam passing through stationary nozzles and blades on a shaft to turn the shaft. The steam can move through the turbine axially (one end of shaft to the other end), radially (shaft to outer casing), or tangentially (around the outer edges of the turbine wheel). In an impulse turbine, the steam is expanded in nozzles and pushes the blades. In a reaction turbine the steam is expanded in the nozzles AND in the blades, the reaction of the expansion of the steam pushes away from the blades spinning the wheel in the process. The expansion of the steam is necessary to increase its velocity through the turbine.