Van der Waals black hole as a heat engine

Abstract

In this work, we attempt to study the thermodynamic behavior of static Van der Waals (VdW) black hole with an anti-de Sitter (AdS) background in the extended phase space. Treating the negative cosmological constant as thermodynamic pressure, we obtain the expressions for enthalpy, Gibb’s free energy and Helmholtz free energy. We study the stability and Joule–Thomson expansion for the black hole. Next, we construct a heat engine by considering the VdW black hole as the working substance. We investigate the maximum efficiency of the black hole heat engine for the Carnot cycle. We also discuss the work done and the efficiency of a new heat engine. Finally, we study the efficiency of the black hole heat engine for the Rankine cycle.