Steam turbines thermal performance

Siddhartha M and Rajkumar N (1999) Performance Enhancement in Coal Fired Thermal Power Plants Part II Steam Turbines, Int J Energy Res, 23 489. 

Steam turbines provide opportunities for process improvements and energy savings. There usually are four separate and redundant process controller packages that perform operator automatic control (OAC), thermal... 

Steam enters the turbine of a power plant operating on the Rankine cycle (Fig. 8.3) at 3,500 kPa and exhausts at 20 kPa. To show the effect of superheating on the performance of the cycle, calculate the thermal efficiency of the cycle and the quality of the exhaust steam from the turbine for turbine-inlet... 

The heat utilisation system will be different, in function of the specific scope of the plant, and will be able to reach - as highest performance limits and with reference to the core characteristics above described - the following performances a) the production of saturated steam at 17 bar b) the production of sub-cooled water at about 210°C. Should steam be used for the production of electric power through a turbine-alternator group, a thermal cycle efficiency of 28% could be achieved, with the production of about 170 electric MW. 

The steam transformers produce a medium pressure motive steam using the steam extracted from the turbine. The produced steam is supplied through the thermal vapour compressor (steam ejector) to the evaporator for desalination. One significant advantage of the MED-TVC process is its ability to use pressure energy of the steam for desalination. The performance summary of the SMART nuclear desalination plant is as follows ... 

Fuel cell power systems contain an assembly of electrochemical cells, which oxidize a fuel to generate direct current electricity. Balance-of-plant subsystems may include controls, thermal management, a fuel processor, and a power conditioner. Some fuel cell power systems may contain additional power generating equipment such as steam generators, gas turbine generators, or micro-turbine generators. The net power output and all the fuel input to the system shall be taken into account in the performance test calculations. 

In the 1950s, the idea of using supercritical water appeared to be rather attractive for steam generators/turbines in the thermal power industry. The objective was to increase the total thermal efficiency of coal-fired thermal power plants. At supercritical pressures, there is no liquid—vapor phase transition therefore, there is no such phenomenon as critical heat flux or dryout. It is only within a certain range of parameters that deteriorated heat transfer may occur. Work in this area was mainly performed in the former USSR and in the US in the 1950s—1980s. 

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