When discussing Carnot engines, it is assumed that the engine is in thermal equilibrium with the source and the sink during the heat addition and heat rejection processes, respectively. That is, it is assumed that T*H = TH and T*L = TL so that there is no external irreversibility. In that case, the thermal efficiency of the Carnot engine is ηC = 1 - TL/TH.
In reality, however, we must maintain a reasonable temperature difference between the two heat transfer media in order to have an acceptable heat transfer rate through a finite heat exchanger surface area. The heat transfer rates in that case can be expressed as

where h and A are the heat transfer coefficient and heat transfer surface area, respectively. When the values of h, A, TH, and TL are fixed, show that the power output will be a maximum when

Also, show that the maximum net power output in this case is

C.max Heat source TH Ou Heat engine Heat sink