Plant Design

  • Coal to Gas Once More for Dominion

    Dominion Virginia Power plans to convert its oldest coal-fired power plant, the 227-MW Bremo Power Station near Bremo Bluff, Va., to natural gas, the company announced earlier this month. The two-unit plant would be the ninth in its fleet to be closed or converted to alternative fuels.

  • Jinzhushan 3: The World’s First PC-Fired Low Mass Flux Vertical Tube Supercritical Boiler, Part 1

    The world’s first supercritical pulverized coal–fired low mass flux vertical tube Benson boiler is Jinzhushan 3, located in the Hunan Province of the People’s Republic of China. The 600-MW Babcock & Wilcox Power Generation Group Inc. once-through boiler burns Chinese anthracite using downshot pulverized coal (PC) technology. Part 1 of this three-part article provides a project summary and overview. The other two parts will look at technology features of the unique boiler design and plant performance test results.

  • Design Features of Advanced Ultrasupercritical Plants, Part III

    Advanced ultrasupercritical (A-USC) is a term used to designate a coal-fired power plant design with the inlet steam temperature to the turbine at 700C to 760C. In the first two parts of this three-part report, we introduced the A-USC boiler and the metallurgical advancements required for the A-USC boiler to operate at such high temperatures. This final report explores the A-USC boiler’s unique design challenges.

  • Optimizing Your Coal Ash Recovery Operation

    Coal combustion products often can be recycled into a variety of construction and building materials. However, first you must be able to retrieve the wet ash from a holding pond before the ash can be dried and sold.

  • Design Features of Advanced Ultrasupercritical Plants, Part II

    Advanced ultrasupercritical (A-USC) is a term used to designate a coal-fired power plant design with the inlet steam temperature to the turbine at 700C to 760C. In Part I of this three-part report, we introduced the A-USC boiler. In this segment, we look at the metallurgical advancements required for the A-USC boiler to operate at such high temperatures. The final report will explore the A-USC boiler’s unique design challenges.

  • Coal-to-Gas Switching: It’s All in the Price

    Trying to assess the potential for coal-to-gas switching in today’s environment is something of an art form. Suppose for a moment that one were able to devise an economic model that truly replicates real-world generation dispatch for plant operators. A model is only as good as the inputs that go into it, and, let’s face it, future natural gas prices are a critical component.

  • Design Features of Advanced Ultrasupercritical Plants, Part I

    Advanced ultrasupercritical (A-USC) is a term used to designate a coal-fired power plant design with the inlet steam temperature to the turbine at 700C to 760C. In Part I of a three-part report, we introduce the A-USC boiler. Future reports will discuss the metallurgical and boiler design challenges.

  • Constructing and Managing Coal Ash Landfills

    Creating a landfill to hold dry boiler ash is a challenging proposition these days. There’s more to the project than you might imagine, as you’ll learn from this article about the development of a typical new ash landfill.

  • Wet Booster Fans Optimize Power Station Performance with FGD and Wet Stack

    A Romanian lignite-fired power station wanted to minimize the operating cost of the flue gas desulfurization (FGD) system by placing the booster fans in the "wet position," between the wet FGD scrubber and the wet stack, where they would consume significantly less power. A number of combined environmental effects must be considered in this design.

  • Improved Performance from Priority-Based Intelligent Sootblower Systems

    When sootblower operation frequency is too high, a plant risks losing power generation from tube leaks; but when sootblower frequency is too low, there is a risk of boiler pluggage. Intelligent sootblowing finds the right balance between tube erosion and plant economic operation.