March 1, 2010

Big Bend’s Multi-Unit SCR Retrofit

R. Scott Bartz, Tampa Electric Co., and Paul G. Hoornaert and Andrea N. Massa, Sargent & Lundy LLC

Safety First

Safety is of the highest priority to Tampa Electric. For the BBPS SCR project, all contractors were required, at a minimum, to adhere to TECO’s written safety standards, including confined space, fall protection, and hot works standards. Due to Tampa Electric’s strong commitment to safety, more than 2.9 million man-hours had been completed as of December 2009 without a lost-time incident.

Last Project on Schedule

Today, Units 3 and 4 SCRs have been operating successfully to meet the NO_x reduction targets and have been able to operate at or below the required 30-day rolling average for NO_x emissions. No significant problems have been encountered on either unit with respect to the SCR and the accompanying equipment installations. Unit 2 is successfully meeting its project design NO_x reduction after entering commercial service in mid-2009. The Unit 1 SCR outage is under way, and start-up is scheduled for spring of this year.

—R. Scott Bartz (rsbartz@tecoenergy.com) is manager of construction for energy supply for Tampa Electric. Paul G. Hoornaert and Andrea N. Massa work for Sargent & Lundy LLC.

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