Improving Natural Draft Cooling Tower Performance With Heat Injection

This paper presents an assessment of heat injection as a means of improving natural draft cooling tower performance. The concept involves injecting heat into the cooling tower exit air/vapor stream immediately above the drift eliminators in order to increase the difference between the density of the exit air/vapor stream and the ambient air. The density difference between the air/vapor in the cooling tower stack and the ambient air is the engine that drives airflow through the cooling tower. The enhancement of the airflow through the cooling tower (the natural draft) results in more evaporation and thus lowers the circulating water temperature. Because the heat is injected above the drift eliminators, it does not heat the circulating water. To evaluate the cooling tower performance improvement as a function of heat injection rate, a thermal/aerodynamic computer model of Entergy’s White Bluff 1 & 2 and Independence 1 & 2 (approximately 840 MW each) natural draft cooling towers was developed. The computer model demonstrated that very substantial reductions in cold water temperature (up to 7°F) are obtainable by the injection of heat. This paper also discusses a number of possible heat sources. Sources of heat covered include extraction steam, auxiliary steam, boiler blow-down, and waste heat from a combustion turbine. The latter source of heat would create a combined cycle unit with the combination taking place in the condensing part of the cycle (bottom of the cycle) instead of the steam portion of the cycle (top of the cycle).

Weak-Link Analysis of Motor-Operated Butterfly Valve

The purpose of this paper is to address the structural integrity of the motor operated butterfly valve assembly by providing the methodology and equations to quantitatively determine the permissible component load in the load path from the operator to the valve. The weak link analysis is to determine the maximum allowable torque on the butterfly valve by equating the stresses caused by the torque and seismic load with the appropriate allowable stress value, and then the unknown torque is solved. Analysis methods are based on classical static force balancing equations and on classical axial, shear, and bending stress equations using the worst possible load combinations including seismic loads resulting from design basis earthquake.

Repowering and Retrofitting

At the start of this new century, environmental regulations and free-market economics are becoming the key drivers for the electricity generating industry. Advances in Gas Turbine (GT) technology, allied with integration and refinement of Heat Recovery Steam Generators (HRSG) and Steam Turbine (ST) plant, have made Combined Cycle installations the most efficient of the new power station types. This potential can also be realized, to equal effect, by adding GT’s and HRSG’s to existing conventional steam power plants in a so-called ‘repowering’ process. This paper presents the economical and environmental considerations of retrofitting the steam turbine within repowering schemes. Changing the thermal cycle parameters of the plant, for example by deletion of the feed heating steambleeds or by modified live and reheat steam conditions to suit the combined cycle process, can result in off-design operation of the existing steam turbine. Retrofitting the steam turbine to match the combined cycle unit can significantly increase the overall cycle efficiency compared to repowering without the ST upgrade. The paper illustrates that repowering, including ST retrofitting, when considered as a whole at the project planning stage, has the potential for greater gain by allowing proper plant optimization. Much of the repowering in the past has been carried out without due regard to the benefits of re-matching the steam turbine. Retrospective ST upgrade of such cases can still give benefit to the plant owner, especially when it is realized that most repowering to date has retained an unmodified steam turbine (that first went into operation some decades before). The old equipment will have suffered deterioration due to aging and the steam path will be to an archaic design of poor efficiency. Retrofitting older generation plant with modern leading-edge steam-path technology has the potential for realizing those substantial advances made over the last 20 to 30 years. Some examples, given in the paper, of successfully retrofitted steam turbines applied in repowered plants will show, by specific solution, the optimization of the economics and benefit to the environment of the converted plant as a whole.

Thermodynamic Performance of Complex Gas Turbine Cycles

This paper deals with the thermodynamic performance of complex gas turbine cycles involving inter-cooling, re-heating and regeneration. The performance has been evaluated based on the mathematical modeling of various elements of gas turbine for the real situation. The fuel selected happens to be natural gas and the internal convection / film / transpiration air cooling of turbine bladings have been assumed. The analysis has been applied to the current state-of-the-art gas turbine technology and cycle parameters in four classes: Large industrial, Medium industrial, Aero-derivative and Small industrial. The results conform with the performance of actual gas turbine engines. It has been observed that the plant efficiency is higher at lower inter-cooling (surface), reheating and regeneration yields much higher efficiency and specific power as compared to simple cycle. There exists an optimum overall compression ratio and turbine inlet temperature in all types of complex configuration. The advanced turbine blade materials and coating withstand high blade temperature, yields higher efficiency as compared to lower blade temperature materials.

Cofiring Tire-Derived Fuel With Coal

Tires provide a resource of significant interest to many utilities. Tires—and tire-derived fuel (TDF)—have a high calorific value along with other favorable fuel characteristics. At the same time they present material preparation and handling issues for fuel users. For environmental reasons, they are more difficult and costly to dispose of in landfills. In 1990, only 25 million tires or 11% of the annually generated scrap tires in the U.S. were utilized (recycled, retreaded, and burned for energy). In 1994, this number increased to 138 million tires or 55% of the annually generated scrap tires with the largest increase due to tires used for energy (101 million tires). With an estimated number between 1–3 billion tires in stockpiles throughout the United States, this potential energy source is enormous. This paper will review several commercial demonstrations of tire-derived fuel cofired with coal in industrial and utility furnaces. Included will be discussions on fuel characteristics, preparation and handling of the tire-derived fuel, methods of utilization of the cofired fuel including appropriate combustion systems (e.g., cyclone boilers, stokers, fluidized bed boilers) and environmental results of the cofiring demonstrations.

Parametric Studies of Power Plant Performance Monitoring

Real-time performance monitoring of coal-fired power plants is becoming very important due to the impending deregulation of the electric power industry. Performance testing is made to be real-time by changing the traditional output loss method to include an estimation of coal composition based on the Continuous Emission Monitoring System (CEMS) data. This paper illustrates the robustness of the calculations by introducing a variance into each of the calculation inputs to access its effect on the final outputs of heatrate, boiler efficiency and coal flow. Though the original study was over five power plants this paper presents results for the two most diverse coals.

Heat Flux Evaluation in a Test Furnace Equipped With High Temperature Air Combustion (HTAC) Technique

High Temperature Air Combustion has already been applied in various industrial furnaces. Steel producers use most of the revamped furnaces. These are: • Batch and continuous heating furnaces in which HRS burners with open flames were used, • Batch and continuous heat treatment furnaces in which HRS burners with radiant tubes were used. Apart from steel industry the HTAC systems were applied to melt aluminium or to incinerate odour, vapour gases for example in pulp and paper industry. In all these applications very high fuel savings (sometimes as high as 60%), reduction of NOx and production increase (by 20–50%) was achieved. Progress in applications of the HTAC increased also needs of more information and data required by furnace and process designers. For this reason study in larger scale where at least one set of regenerative burner systems is installed are very much needed. Aim of such studies is not only to verify furnace performance with respect to the known general advantages of HTAC but are focused on specific problems related to furnace and high-cycle regenerative burners operation, process and product properties or type of fuels used. Parallel to the semi-industrial tests numerical models of furnaces have to be developed and verified. In this work, mainly results of heat flux measurements as well as results of numerical modeling of heat transfer in the HTAC test furnace are presented. Results were obtained for propane combustion at firing rate equal to 200 kW. The general code, STAR-CD, was employed in this work to analyse the HTAC test furnace numerically. HTAC test furnace at Royal Institute of Technology (KTH) with capacity of 200 kW was used in this work. The furnace is equipped with two different high-cycle regenerative systems (HRS). In both systems the “honeycomb” regenerator is used. The two-burner system is made of two pairs (four burners) of high cycle-regenerative burners with switching time between 10 and 40 seconds. HTAC test furnace is equipped with four air-cooled tubes to take away heat from the furnace. The total radiative heat flux measured in the HTAC furnace shows very uniform distribution over the whole combustion chamber. For total radiative heat flux, the values are in the range of 110–130 kW/m2 as measured by means of the total radiative heat flow meter at the furnace temperature 1100 C. Average total radiation flux on the top furnace wall is as high as 245.5 kW/m2 as well as total incident radiation flux. Total radiation heat flux on the air-cooled tube surface is very uniform along and around the tubes. Average radiant heat flux taken away by air cool tube is 35.46 kW/m2.

Prompt Leak Detection for High Pressure Feedwater Heaters

I. THE NEED. A. In high pressure feedwater heaters, a tube leak quickly claims several neighboring tubes as collateral victims. B. Prompt detection of the initial leak would save the neighboring tubes from damage and preclude a potential turbine water induction incident. II. EXAMPLE. A. A Midwest generating station replaced 12 old high pressure heaters. The new heaters contained 304N SS tubes. In one of the new heaters, an unknown localized contaminant caused a single tube leak within the first year. This single leak went undetected until several surrounding tubes were lost due to impingement from the initial leak. And even the conservatively sized normal and emergency drains were overwhelmed, causing the heater to trip on high level. III. CAPABILITY OF SMART LEVEL CONTROLS. A. There are three known possibilities that would cause high drain-flow conditions in a feedwater heater. 1. High Unit Load. 2. The upstream feedwater heater is out of service. 3. A tube leak. B. Traditional Local level controls can sense high flow conditions, but cannot tell why. Most systems will alarm the opening of the emergency drain valve, but by that time, the collateral tube damage is usually severe. “Smart” Level Controls have the capability to distinguish between these conditions, thus allowing it to give early notification of a tube leak, before collateral damage becomes severe.

Water Recovery Systems for Steam-Injected Gas Turbines: Size Optimization and Life Cycle Savings

Steam injection in gas turbines has been used for many years to increase the power output as well as the efficiency of the system and, more recently, to reduce the formation of NOx during the combustion. The major drawback in steam-injection technology is the need of large amounts of fresh water that is eventually lost into the atmosphere along with the exhaust gas. This loss not only increases the operating costs of the system, but also creates other “external” costs in terms of environmental impacts. In order to take advantage of the steam-injection technology and reduce both operating costs and potential environmental impacts, water recovery systems to recuperate the injected steam from the exhaust gas can be implemented. This paper briefly describes the computer models developed at the University of Massachusetts Amherst to optimize water recovery systems. As an example, the optimum size, power requirement and capital cost for two different systems applied to the GE LM2500 gas turbine are shown. Finally, a comparative economic analysis between the costs of installing and operating a water recovery system and the costs of buying and treating water on a regular basis during the lifetime of the project is presented. The results support the economic feasibility of water recovery for mid-size steam-injected gas turbines before having introduced the external costs associated with the use of water resources.

Applying New and Improved Technology to an Existing Generator-Drive Steam Turbine

There is growing pressure to reduce the pay back period of major capital expenditures, and in most cases, revamping existing turbomachinery provides more attractive economics than new equipment. Moreover, revamping existing power generation equipment with modern technology mitigates the expenses associated with obtaining new environmental licensing. Today, innovative application of technological advancements in mechanical and aero-thermodynamic design/analysis methods combined with new manufacturing methods is yielding significant performance improvements. This paper details the revamping of a 36 MW generator-drive turbine that resulted in an eleven point improvement in steam rate. Details of the steampath thermodynamic design/ analysis methods, sealing, diaphragm construction, blade design and low-pressure steam path design, etc. are presented.