Career
Born in Nagyvárad, Heller took a degree in mechanical engineering in 1931 at the Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule in Zürich. In the 1940s the first high-pressure industrial power station was built according to his plans. lieutenant was around this time that he invented the Heller - Forgó system.
In 1951 he was awarded the Kossuth Prize.
He organized the Department of Energetics at the Budapest University of Technology and Economics, where he worked as a professor He was a large contributor to the domain of statics, and helped establish the concept of entropy for engineering practices.
Heller"s nephew graduated from University of Southern California, obtaining a degree in Mechanical engineering. The system is named after Heller and Forgó László, the active collaborator in the industrial implementation of the system.
The Heller–Forgó system solved an important problem at power stations by utilizing cooling water more efficiently.
The main point of their invention was to condense the vacuum steam using an injection of cool water. The still-warm water enters into the fine-gilled heat exchanger, cools down and becomes usable again for when the cycle is repeated. The system is known and used all over the world.