POWER

Southwestern Electric Power Co. (SWEPCO) and the Arkansas Public Service Commission (APSC) on Tuesday asked the Arkansas Supreme Court for a rehearing, after the high court last month overturned a 2007 permit awarded by the PSC to the utility’s 600-MW John W. Turk, Jr. power plant. SWEPCO said that it plans to continue construction of the $1.7 billion project—the nation’s first ultrasupercritical coal plant—to meet its commitments to serve the company’s customers in three states.

CMS Energy subsidiary Consumers Energy last week announced that it is deferring the development of an 830-MW coal-fired power plant planned for Hampton Township. State regulators had last year approved an air permit for the $2 billion-plus project on the condition that it use stringent emission controls and that it was ready for carbon capture and sequestration when the technology was feasible.

Mississippi Power Co. on Thursday said it would proceed with plans to build a 582-MW integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC) plant as proposed in Kemper County after the Mississippi Public Service Commission (MPSC) relaxed restrictions it had placed on the project.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit on Friday dismissed without rehearing, on procedural grounds, a controversial climate change “public nuisance” case in which 14 individuals had filed a class-action lawsuit against insurance, coal, and chemical companies, seeking relief for property damages resulting from Hurricane Katrina.

Depressed power demand due to a slow economic recovery will continue to be a major driver affecting bulk power system reliability during the summer months, the North American Reliability Corp. (NERC) said last week in its annual summer reliability assessment report.

Every power engineer must have a firm grasp of the rudiments of how fuel is processed to produce electricity in a power generation facility. With this article, we continue our three-part series on the essentials of recovering heat from flue gas to dry and process coal, with the goal of improving overall plant operating efficiency.

Soldiers could one day carry 600-W power plants on their backs, or set up arrays of up to 20 kW in streams deeper than 4 feet, if a prototype being developed by California-based Bourne Energy comes to fruition.

Rental Solutions & Services (RSS), a global provider of rental power and cooling, recently launched its latest product offering, temporary desalination, or mobile water. The company, which recently opened a new office in Cyprus to serve the Mediterranean market, says its rental desalination, or mobile water technology has various applications, especially where freshwater is scarce […]

I recently had the privilege of moderating the Power Industry Executive Roundtable, part of the annual ELECTRIC POWER Conference & Exhibition opening ceremonies. Usually, the power industry executives have predictable views of important issues, but not this year.

AES Secures PPA with Electricity Vietnam for 1,200-MW Coal Plant. AES Corp. subsidiary AES VCM Mong Duong Power Co. Ltd. in April signed a power purchase agreement (PPA) with state power company Electricity Vietnam (EVN) for Mong Duong II, a proposed 1,200-MW coal-fired power plant. In support of this agreement, AES VCM has also entered […]

Caterpillar introduced the G3512E, an advanced natural gas–fueled generator set that was designed for maximum efficiency in extended-duty distributed generation and combined heat and power (CHP) applications. Driven by a Caterpillar electronically controlled, lean-burn gaseous-fueled reciprocating engine, the G3512E generator set offers high power density and fuel efficiency while maintaining tight NOx control. It provides […]

A recent trend in nuclear power plant upgrades has been the replacement of the motor-generator (MG) sets that drive the reactor circulating pumps with variable-frequency drives (VFD). Siemens’ first application of VFDs in this industry began in 2000 with an installation of six VFDs at the Browns Ferry Nuclear Plant. The use of the VFD continues to expand, and upgrades were recently completed at several U.S. plants, including the Hatch Nuclear Plant in Georgia.

ESAB Cutting Systems launched the Falcon FXA, a small gantry-cutting machine that is designed for improved cutting performance. The machine features heavy-duty gantry, rack-and-pinion drives, digital AC drive amplifiers, and AC brushless motors. It comes with three tools—two oxy-fuel torches and one plasma—and covers a 6-inch by 12-inch working area. These process tools allow the […]

Since the collapse of Enron and the wholesale power markets, the vitality of competition in retail markets for electricity has waned in most regions of the U.S., with the exception of Texas. At KEMA’s 21st annual Executive Forum in late March, 300 attendees converged on Dallas to discuss and debate the dynamics and changes now facing residential and commercial customers in most regions of the U.S. and Canada. Founded in 1927, KEMA is a global provider of business and technical consulting, operational support, measurement and inspection, and testing and certification for the energy and utility industry. A summary of the many presentations follows.

Dresser Waukesha is a familiar name associated with large, gas-fueled stationary engines for power generation and gas compression applications around the world. Each new project location presents a unique set of site variables that must be taken into consideration—such as fuel quality, air/fuel ratio, temperature, humidity, altitude, load, and exhaust after-treatment—when providing the customer a meaningful performance guarantee. To fully characterize every engine option with such a wide range of fuel types and quality and in widely varying environmental conditions across the global is an impossible chore.

An oil skimmer could simplify your plant water maintenance activiites.

Timing is everything in the world of electric power generation. The timing of the delivery of electricity is affected by both the users’ demand and the speed with which a variety of energy sources supply power to the transmission system. Modern grids require reliable energy sources to instantly meet the needs of their users.

Fast-starting combined-cycle plants are designed for a certain operating life based on a customer-specified set of operating scenarios. During that design phase, periodic inspection and maintenance procedures to benchmark equipment actual wear and tear should be developed, but seldom are. Without an accurate assessment of remaining equipment life for components subjected to fast and frequent […]

Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s new Kawasaki Thermal Power Plant claims the title of having the highest combined-cycle efficiency in the world: 59.1%. The new gas-fired facility is equipped with three 500-MW single-shaft combined-cycle blocks. Each block is based on the MHI M701G2 gas turbine, which is the largest gas turbine currently in commercial operation.

Now that U.S. utilities have taken federal stimulus funds and seamlessly built out two-way advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) connecting utility control centers and end users (ok, not completely, but let’s assume that the “stall-ulus” becomes a true stimulus), the question becomes, what’s next? At the moment, this new “comm layer” or “platform” has utilities planning in two directions: upstream and downstream from the smart meters.

The Kerry-Graham-Lieberman bill is a very important step forward in the climate debate. We need federal action on climate legislation now. And we need to get it right.

Carol Browner, director of the White House Office of Energy and Climate Change Policy, trusts the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report’s conclusions that anthropogenic carbon emissions are the primary cause of climate change. When pressed, the customary response of Browner and other proponents has been to rely on that oft-cited list of 2,500 scientists said to have given their full support of the report’s conclusions. Browner should check her facts.

Ensuring the availability of water for power plants is a matter of both water quantity and quality. As freshwater becomes less available for power plant use, new supplies from marginal or impaired sources will require new cooling technologies. We look at cooling equipment options and how water availability and quality affect cooling system design and cost.

In recent months, U.S. utilities, manufacturers, and technology firms received $3.4 billion as part of the economic stimulus package. These funds have been allocated to help modernize the country’s electric power system and increase energy efficiency. However, as these "smart-grid" grants continue to be awarded, questions are being raised about how to safeguard smart meters and other critical infrastructure from cyber attacks.

New York regulators in April approved construction of a 20-MW energy storage system at the site of an operating coal-fired power station near Union, Broome County. When operational, the $22.3 million project, owned by AES ES Westover LLC—an AES Corp. subsidiary—will use the technology to participate in New York’s growing day-ahead market for ancillary services and regulation.

Austin Energy replaced the selective catalytic reduction (SCR) catalyst twice over five years for its four peaker turbines. The duct modifications and injection grid redesign, combined with new catalyst, are producing high NOx reduction and low ammonia slip, and the catalyst is now expected to last at least five years.

In an unusual two-option proposal that drew clashing views from green groups and power plant operators, the Environmental Protection Agency has proposed regulating coal combustion ash either as a nonhazardous waste subject to tougher management and disposal requirements or as a "special" hazardous waste that would have similar controls but still be eligible for recycling and reuse in products such as Portland cement.

After more than a decade of debate, in April, U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar approved Cape Wind, a proposed 130-turbine offshore wind farm for Nantucket Sound in Massachusetts. It would be the first wind facility in U.S. waters. Despite remaining hurdles, the approval marks a shift in political winds for the nation’s fledgling industry, and it could spur further development of projects proposed for relatively shallow waters along the East Coast and in the Great Lakes.

Gas turbines require clean gas to operate efficiently. Particulate contamination fouls fuel nozzles, causes increases in flue stack emissions, and occasionally causes unplanned plant outages. Now a new real-time natural gas cleanliness monitoring and web-based alarm system is providing valuable protection for natural gas–fired power plants. The adaptation of laser light–scattering technology for the purpose of contaminant measurement in high-pressure gaseous pipelines provides a method of monitoring liquid and solid contamination levels.

Less than 24 hours after the unveiling of sweeping Senate legislation to reduce U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, the Environmental Protection Agency released a final Clean Air Act rule that defines emission thresholds for greenhouse gas permitting requirements for power plants and other large stationary sources.