Why bypass desuperheaters fail; DSSP, CAD, and fast casting salvage nearly totaled pump; Seals of approval; Making gas turbine plants quieter

  Under its Resource Adequacy (RA) program, the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) requires load-serving entities—both independently owned utilities and electric service providers—to demonstrate in both monthly and annual filings that they have purchased capacity commitments of no less than 115% of their peak loads. These purchase requirements are intended to secure sufficient commitments from […]

Integrated gasification combined-cycle (IGCC) power plants are not yet standard designs. Although they use mature coal gasification processes and combustion turbines, disparate technologies and equipment still require custom, laborious interfacing at each site. Every major gas turbine vendor now can point to one or more power-producing IGCC projects based on its prime mover, but none yet offers a "reference" plant that has standardized the interfacing enough to justify confidence in two key metrics: $/kW and availability. With an air-blown demonstration plant based on one of its 130-MW turbines, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries is looking to change the rules of this game.

We Energies’ Pleasant Prairie Power Plant is a good example of how existing plants retrofitted with NOx and SO2 removal systems benefit from early planning and action. P4, as everyone calls it, recently completed a multiyear project to add a selective catalytic reduction system to one of its two units and a scrubber to both. The unique design and contracting aspects of the project make Pleasant Prairie one of POWER’s top coal-fired plants of 2007.

Ten years ago, POWER selected Tampa Electric’s 250-MW Polk Power Station and its revolutionary integrated gasification combined-cycle demonstration project as the magazine’s 1997 Plant of the Year. Although no new commercial IGCC projects have been built since then, interest in deploying the coal-gasification technology is getting traction in some parts of the U.S. In 2007, POWER recognizes Polk Unit 1 as a Top Plant for developing trailblazing O&M practices and technical improvements that enable it to operate today as reliably as a modern pulverized coal plant, with lower pollutant emissions.

FirstEnergy’s R.E. Burger Plant has hosted a number of R&D projects over the years, but none as large as the demonstration of Powerspan’s 50-MW Electro-Catalytic Oxidation (ECO) multipollutant removal process a few years ago. Credit Powerspan for scaling up the demo unit and for adding CO₂ as a target of a new pilot process called ECO₂. And don’t forget the behind-the-scenes support of Burger’s plant staff and their willingness to incubate R&D projects while producing power. That’s what makes R.E. Burger a Top Plant in our book.

The infrequent or improper introduction of biocides into a plant cooling system may make fouling within it worse, by creating thick biofilms that can foster corrosion, reduce heat transfer, and increase water pumps’ operating costs. At the other end of the spectrum, overuse of biocides can waste expensive chemicals. Optimizing the quantity, frequency, and type of dosage can improve both the health of a cooling system and its plant’s bottom line.

Ongoing research into experience with plant- and fleet-level software reveals that these applications work side by side but do not necessarily function as an integrated “knowledge management” system. On the supplier side, the industry continues to be fragmented, with individual programs governing a narrow part of the overall plant.

September 1886 Four years after this magazine was launched, the editors reviewed the latest improvements to industrial boilers, beginning with the Backus furnace (Figure 1). 1. The Backus furnace. “This furnace is provided with a brick arch placed just back of the fire-doors, that is intended to deflect the currents of air that are admitted […]