Overall Performance of Advanced H2/Air Cycle Power Plants Based on Coal Decarbonisation

Author(s):  
M. Gambini ◽  
M. Vellini

In this paper the overall performance of a new advanced mixed cycle (AMC), fed by hydrogen-rich fuel gas, has been evaluated. Obviously, hydrogen must be produced and here we have chosen the coal gasification for its production, quantifying all the thermal and electric requirements. At first, a simple combination between hydrogen production section and power section is performed. In fact, the heat loads of the first section can be satisfied by using the various raw syngas cooling, without using some material streams taken from the power section, but also without using part of heat, available in the production section and rejected into the environment, in the power section. The final result is very poor: over 34%. Then, by using the Pinch Technology, a more efficient, even if more complex, solution can be conceived: in this case the overall efficiency is very interesting: 39%. These results are very similar to those of a combined cycle power plant, equipped with the same systems and analyzed under the same hypotheses. The final result is very important because the “clean” use of coal in new power plant types must be properly investigated: in fact coal is the most abundant and the cheapest fossil fuel available on earth; moreover, hydrogen production, by using coal, is an interesting outlook because hydrogen has the potential to become the main energy carrier in a future sustainable energy economy.

Author(s):  
M. Gambini ◽  
G. L. Guizzi ◽  
M. Vellini

In this paper the overall performance of a new advanced mixed cycle (AMC), fed by hydrogen-rich fuel gas, has been evaluated. Obviously, hydrogen must be produced and here we have chosen the coal gasification for its production, quantifying all the thermal and electric requirements. At first, the thermodynamic performance of this cycle has been investigated in comparison with that attainable by combined cycle power plants (CC). Then, the power plants have been integrated with the fuel production system. Including all the material and energy flows, the overall performance has been evaluated. The main result of the performed investigation is that the two power plants attain the same efficiency level with and without H2 production requirements (over 60% and over 34% without and with hydrogen production respectively). The final carbon dioxide emissions are about 0.123 kg/kWh both for AMC and CC. It is important to underline that the “clean” use of coal in new power plant types must be properly investigated because it is the most abundant and the cheapest fossil fuel available on earth; moreover, hydrogen production, by using coal, is an interesting prospect because hydrogen has the potential to become the main energy carrier in a future sustainable energy economy.


Author(s):  
Marco Gambini ◽  
Michela Vellini

In this paper the overall performance of an advanced combined cycle (CC) and of a new advanced mixed cycle (AMC), fed by hydrogen-rich fuel gas, has been evaluated. Obviously, hydrogen must be produced and here we have chosen the partial oxidation of natural gas for its production, quantifying all the thermal and electric requirements. At first, a simple combination between hydrogen production section and power section is performed. In fact, the heat loads of the first section can be satisfied (nearly completely) by using the various raw syngas cooling, but in this case it is not possible to use any part of this heat in the power section. The final result is an overall efficiency of about 44%. Then, by using the Pinch Technology, a more efficient, even if more complex, solution can be conceived; in this case the overall efficiency becomes very interesting especially for the AMC (efficiency is over 50%). This result is very important with the view of a transition toward a “clean energy” economy, based on an energy carrier such as hydrogen.


Author(s):  
Rolf H. Kehlhofer

In the past 15 years the combined-cycle (gas/steam turbine) power plant has come into its own in the power generation market. Today, approximately 30 000 MW of power are already installed or being built as combined-cycle units. Combined-cycle plants are therefore a proven technology, showing not only impressive thermal efficiency ratings of up to 50 percent in theory, but also proving them in practice and everyday operation (1) (2). Combined-cycle installations can be used for many purposes. They range from power plants for power generation only, to cogeneration plants for district heating or combined cycles with maximum additional firing (3). The main obstacle to further expansion of the combined cycle principle is its lack of fuel flexibility. To this day, gas turbines are still limited to gaseous or liquid fuels. This paper shows a viable way to add a cheap solid fuel, coal, to the list. The plant system in question is a 2 × 150 MW combined-cycle plant of BBC Brown Boveri with integrated coal gasification plant of British Gas/Lurgi. The main point of interest is that all the individual components of the power plant described in this paper have proven their worth commercially. It is therefore not a pilot plant but a viable commercial proposition.


Author(s):  
M. Gambini ◽  
M. Vellini

In this paper two options for H2 production by means of fossil fuels are presented, evaluating their performance when integrated with advanced H2/air cycles. The investigation has been developed with reference to two different schemes, representative both of consolidated technology (combined cycle power plants) and of innovative technology (a new advance mixed cycle, named AMC). The two methods, here considered, to produce H2 are: • coal gasification: it permits transformation of a solid fuel into a gaseous one, by means of partial combustion reactions; • steam-methane reforming: it is the simplest and potentially the most economic method for producing hydrogen in the foreseeable future. These hydrogen production plants require material and energy integrations with the power section, and the best connections must be investigated in order to obtain good overall performance. The main results of the performed investigation are quite variable among the different H2 production options here considered: for example the efficiency value is over 34% for power plants coupled with coal decarbonization system, while it is in a range of 45–48% for power plants coupled with natural gas decarbonization. These differences are similar to those attainable by advanced combined cycle power plants fuelled by natural gas (traditional CC) and coal (IGCC). In other words, the decarbonization of different fossil fuels involves the same efficiency penalty related to the use of different fossil fuel in advanced cycle power plants (from CC to IGCC for example). The CO2 specific emissions depend on the fossil fuel type and the overall efficiency: adopting a removal efficiency of 90% in the CO2 absorption systems, the CO2 emission reduction is 87% and 82% in the coal gasification and in the steam-methane reforming respectively.


1999 ◽  
Vol 122 (2) ◽  
pp. 247-254 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard A. Newby ◽  
Wen-Ching Yang ◽  
Ronald L. Bannister

Fuel gas cleanup processing significantly influences overall performance and cost of IGCC power generation. The raw fuel gas properties (heating value, sulfur content, alkali content, ammonia content, “tar” content, particulate content) and the fuel gas cleanup requirements (environmental and turbine protection) are key process parameters. Several IGCC power plant configurations and fuel gas cleanup technologies are being demonstrated or are under development. In this evaluation, air-blown, fluidized-bed gasification combined-cycle power plant thermal performance is estimated as a function of fuel type (coal and biomass fuels), extent of sulfur removal required, and the sulfur removal technique. Desulfurization in the fluid bed gasifier is combined with external hot fuel gas desulfurization, or, alternatively with conventional cold fuel gas desulfurization. The power plant simulations are built around the Siemens Westinghouse 501F combustion turbine in this evaluation. [S0742-4795(00)00502-0]


Author(s):  
W. C. Yang ◽  
R. A. Newby ◽  
R. L. Bannister

Air-blown coal gasification for combined-cycle power generation is a technology soon to be demonstrated. A process evaluation of air-blown IGCC performed to estimate the plant heat rate, electrical output and potential emissions are described in this paper. A process model of an air-blown IGCC power system based on the Westinghouse 501F combustion turbine was developed to conduct the performance evaluation. Parametric studies were performed to develop an understanding of the power plant sensitivity to the major operating parameters and process options. Advanced hot fuel gas cleaning and conventional cold fuel gas cleaning options were both considered.


Author(s):  
Frank Sander ◽  
Richard Carroni ◽  
Stefan Rofka ◽  
Eribert Benz

The rigorous reduction of greenhouse gas emissions in the upcoming decades is only achievable with contribution from the following strategies: production efficiency, demand reduction of energy and carbon dioxide (CO2) capture from fossil fueled power plants. Since fossil fueled power plants contribute largely to the overall global greenhouse gas emissions (> 25% [1]), it is worthwhile to capture and store the produced CO2 from those power generation processes. For natural-gas-fired power plants, post-combustion CO2 capture is the most mature technology for low emissions power plants. The capture of CO2 is achieved by chemical absorption of CO2 from the exhaust gas of the power plant. Compared to coal fired power plants, an advantage of applying CO2 capture to a natural-gas-fired combined cycle power plant (CCPP) is that the reference cycle (without CO2 capture) achieves a high net efficiency. This far outweighs the drawback of the lower CO2 concentration in the exhaust. Flue Gas Recirculation (FGR) means that flue gas after the HRSG is partially cooled down and then fed back to the GT intake. In this context FGR is beneficial because the concentration of CO2 can be significantly increased, the volumetric flow to the CO2 capture unit will be reduced, and the overall performance of the CCPP with CO2 capture is increased. In this work the impact of FGR on both the Gas Turbine (GT) and the Combined Cycle Power Plant (CCPP) is investigated and analyzed. In addition, the impact of FGR for a CCPP with and without CO2 capture is investigated. The fraction of flue gas that is recirculated back to the GT, need further to be cooled, before it is mixed with ambient air. Sensitivity studies on flue gas recirculation ratio and temperature are conducted. Both parameters affect the GT with respect to change in composition of working fluid, the relative humidity at the compressor inlet, and the impact on overall performance on both GT and CCPP. The conditions at the inlet of the compressor also determine how the GT and water/steam cycle are impacted separately due to FGR. For the combustion system the air/fuel-ratio (AFR) is an important parameter to show the impact of FGR on the combustion process. The AFR indicates how close the combustion process operates to stoichiometric (or technical) limit for complete combustion. The lower the AFR, the closer operates the combustion process to the stoichiometric limit. Furthermore, the impact on existing operational limitations and the operational behavior in general are investigated and discussed in context of an operation concept for a GT with FGR.


1980 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. W. Larson

The idea of a combined cycle power plant integrated with a coal gasification process has attracted broad interest in recent years. This interest is based on unique attributes of this concept which include potentially low pollutant emissions, low heat rate and competitive economics as compared to conventional steam plants with stack gas scrubbing. Results from a survey of technical literature containing performance and economic predictions have been compiled for comparison and evaluation of this new technique. These performance and economic results indicate good promise for near-term commercialization of an integrated gasification combined cycle power plant using current gas turbine firing temperatures. Also, these data show that advancements in turbine firing temperature are expected to provide sufficiently favorable economics for the concept to penetrate the market now held by conventional steam power plants.


Author(s):  
Yasuhiro Yoshida ◽  
Takuya Yoshida ◽  
Yuki Enomoto ◽  
Nobuhiro Osaki ◽  
Yoshito Nagahama ◽  
...  

Requirements for the start-up operations of gas turbine combined cycle (GTCC) power plants have become more diverse and now include such items as reduced start-up time, life consumption, and fuel gas consumption. In this paper, an optimization method is developed to solve these multi-objective problems. The method obtains optimized start-up curves by iterating the search for the optimal combination of the start-up parameter values and the evaluation of multiple objective functions. The start-up curves generated by this method were found to converge near the Pareto-front representing the best trade-off between the fuel gas consumption of the gas turbine (GT) and thermal stress in the steam turbine (ST) rotor which are defined as the objective functions. To demonstrate the effectiveness of the developed method, field tests were performed in a commercial power plant. As a result, the fuel gas consumption of HOT start-up was reduced by 22.8% compared with the past operation data. From this result, the developed method was shown to be capable of optimizing the start-up process for GTCC power plants.


Author(s):  
R. Tuccillo ◽  
G. Fontana ◽  
E. Jannelli

In this paper, a general analysis of combined gas-steam cycles for power plants firing with both hydrocarbons and coal derived gas is reported. The purpose of this paper is to study the influence on power plants performance of different kind of fuels and to evaluate the most significant parameters of both gas and combined cycle. Results are presented for plant overall efficiency and net specific work, steam to gas mass flow ratio, dimensionless gas turbine specific speed and diameter, CO2 emissions etc., as functions of gas cycle pressure ratio and of the combustion temperature. Furthermore, for an existing power plant with a 120 MW gas turbine, the authors try to establish in which measure the combined cycle characteristic parameters, the gas turbine operating conditions, and the heat recovery steam generator efficiency, are modified by using synthetic fuels of different composition and calorific value. The influence is also analyzed either of bottoming steam cycle saturation pressure or — in a dual pressure steam cycle — of dimensionless fraction of steam mass flow in high pressure stream. The acquired results seem to constitute useful information on the criteria for the optimal design of a new integrated coal gasification combined cycle (IGCC) power plant.


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