Five years ago, San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station’s Unit 3 turbine experienced substantial damage after the supply of oil to its bearings failed. Because the turbine coasted down without oil…
O&M
Technical articles on all aspects of power plant operation, preventive and predictive maintenance, planned and unplanned outages
Although fluid monitoring technology has come of age in recent years, its level of sophistication varies widely across industries. Some users of bulk chemicals, fuels, and other fluids use state-of-the-art…
Kansas City Power & Light Installing SCR at La Cygne Generating Station Kansas City Power & Light (KCP&L), a subsidiary of Great Plains Energy, has awarded The Babcock & Wilcox…
Between 1998 and 2002 the U.S. experienced an unprecedented power plant construction boom that consisted mostly of gas-fired, combustion turbine – based power plants. This surge in power plant construction…
The 1,768-MW Baldwin Energy Complex in Illinois was the site of a joint-venture pilot project to demonstrate a wireless vibration-monitoring system for a coal pulverizer. The partners in the project…
Stretching meager maintenance dollars is a way of life for most maintenance staff. In past years, the cost of an infrared (IR) camera usually came down to a choice between…
There's a relatively easy way to make a steam plant more efficient and reliable: keep the tubes of its condenser(s) clean. According to George Saxon, Jr., VP of international sales…
Calpine Corp.'s South Point Energy Center in Mohave County, Ariz. (Figure 1) is a 520-MW natural gas-fired, combined-cycle facility with two Siemens Westinghouse 501FD gas turbines and one steam turbine-generator…
The name "Alaska" comes from the Aleut word "alaxsxaq," meaning "an object toward which the action of the sea is directed," in this case the Alaska Peninsula. But alaxsxaq is…
Over the past decade, since industry deregulation, the typical utility power plant has lengthened the maintenance intervals of its major systems to minimize downtime and costs. Many plants schedule spring…