Biomass Fired Superheater for more Efficient Electr Generation From WasteIncinerationPlants025bm 422 1991
Biomass Fired Superheater for more Efficient Electricity Generation from Waste Incineration Plants 1. Aim of the Project The aim of the project is to demonstrate in full scale how to increase steam data for a steam cycle based waste to energy plant, avoiding the normal negative side effect of high temperature corrosion/erosion. Corrosion at high steam temperature is reduced by reduction in the concentration of alkali-metals, chlorides, and fly ash in the flue gas. The waste can be municipal solid waste or agricultural waste, however, in this project it is straw. Photo 1: General view of the carbonisation unit 2. Introduction COWI has developed a new concept based on mild pyrolysis of straw in a carbonisation unit. During, the carbonisation process the straw is converted into a gas fraction and a char fraction. Due to a relatively low process temperature in the carbonisation reactor, the major part of alkali chlorides remains in the char fraction. Therefore, the less corrosive product gas can be used in a separate superheater to boost steam data to for example 80-110 bar and above 500 °C depending on the fuel type and used alloys in the superheater. Thus the power to heat ratio can be improved considerably for new plants. For existing plants, the technical limitations and necessary modifications must be evaluated in each individual case. Char particles are removed from the product gas using a gas/char separator followed by a hot cyclone. The biomass char is used as top-up fuel the steam boiler, with a possibility of load levelling in order to stabilise the steam flow, in case of fluctuations. The metal temperature in the steam boiler is kept below the limits of accelerating high temperature corrosion. The plant was commissioned in May 1996. The demonstration plant is located at Haslev, 65 km south-west of Copenhagen, at the Haslev Combined Heat and Power (CHP) plant which hosted this demonstration project. Haslev CHP plant is the world's first 100% straw fired CHP plant. It was put into operation in 1989 and produces about 5 MWe electricity and 3.6 MWh district heating. The plant uses 5.3 t/h straw delivered in large bales and supplies district heating to about 2000 domestic consumers in the town of Haslev. District heating is supplied at a temperature of 90 °C and returned with a temperature range of 50-60 °C. Main steam data are: 25 ton/h, 65 bar and 420 °C under typical working conditions. The turbine runs at 10,000 rpm and is connected to a generator running 1500 rpm. The electricity is transformed to 50 kV and connected to the main grid. The yearly electricity production is about 17 GWh, corresponding to the need of approximately 3000 households. The overall efficiency is 17.6% electricity and 70% heat on an annual basis. Under optimum conditions, an efficiency of 23% electricity can be reached with 85% overall efficiency. The low electricity gain is due to the low steam data and due to the on-off operation. New plants are showing slightly better performances. 3. Technical Description Based on very positive results from testing of a pilot plant for more than 1000 operation hours, a 15 times larger full-scale plant has been constructed. On the steam line from the boiler to turbine a bypass has been established for connection and testing of the demonstration plant. Figure 1: Simplified diagram of the concept to use product gas to boost steam data The demonstration plant consists of one process line with a design capacity of 675 kg straw per hour. The carbonising unit is fed with loosely cut straw using a 2 step hydraulic piston feeder creating a gas-tight seal. The carbonising unit is a special designed 2 level horizontal double screw plug flow reactor, which is indirectly heated to approx. 600 °C by flue gas in a heat jacket. After separation of char and fines in the hot cyclone, the produced 500-550 °C hot gas fuels a special low NOx burner installed in an adiabatic combustion chamber, where combustion takes place at approx. 1400 °C. Heat is initially used for additional superheating, of the steam from the boiler to the maximum allowable temperature, then at 580-650 °C for heating the carbonising unit, and finally for pre-heating of the combustion air to 360-400 °C, before it is led to the chimney at 150-200 °C. Part of the flue gas can be re-circulated in order to reduce NOx formation and increase efficiency. The separated char is cooled with a slight water dosing and extracted using a hydraulic piston feeder. From here, the char is conveyed to the combustion compartment of the boiler of the basic plant using a pneumatic transport system. The char is used as topping fuel, and the dosing can be controlled according to operational needs of the plant. The process is started by using a start-up fuel i.e. gas or oil, which also can be used as back-up. 4. Performance of the Haslev CHP Plant The operating conditions and the performance of the plant when operated on straw is given in table 1. Table 1: Energy data Parameter Data Straw for the carbonising unit: 0.675 t/h nom, gross (0.240 t/h net) Steam flow from boiler: 11-26 t/h at 410-430 °C Steam from superheater: 480°C (max. 505 °C) Superheater surface: < 580 °C . Combustion temperature: 1250-1500 °C LHV gas: 7-8 MJ/kg LHV char: 26.8 MJ/kg Nominal gas capacity: 900 kW Marginal power share: 42% Marginal heat share: 58% Gross overall efficiency: 78-82% Gas production, nom.: 430 kg/h Char production, nom.: 245 kg/h Power output marginal: 360 - 680 kWe *) Own consumption: 56 kWe, at full load Straw for the basic boiler: 5.3 t/h Power output total plant: Approx. 5-5.5 MWe Heat output total plant: Approx. 13 MJ/s *)Depending on the actual upgrading of steam data. The operational experience from monitoring more than 1000 hours of operation is very positive. The results of testing show an output well above the design value and a stable operation after the commissioning period. The operation safety and availability figures under gas operation have now reached a stage comparable to conventional biomass fired plants. The monitoring period has given all the basic data for validation of the plant and design of the single components for further commercial plants. The plant is fed with up to 675 kg/h straw with a moisture content of 10-22%, producing roughly 0.9-1 MW of gas and 1.7-1.8 MW char. Due to the low process temperature and absence of air, the corrosive elements remain in the char fraction, which is used as topping fuel in the steam boiler. The produced gas is utilised in a separate combustion chamber producing a flue gas with very low content of alkali metals, chlorides and particles, making the flue gas much less corrosive at high steam temperatures than flue gasses from direct combustion of municipal solid waste or straw. Therefore, the produced gas can be used to boost steam data in an external superheater without increasing the corrosion rate. The supply of char to the steam boiler can be controlled in order to stabilise the steam production, which also will lead to increased efficiency and output. If the concept demonstrated in this project is used, when building new plants, the electricity gain could be increased by typically 10-15% on a given heat demand. This is an improvement of approximately 3% points in electricity efficiency which is considered significant. Potential users for the dissemination of this technology are public and private utilities in charge of waste management and energy production. The concept mainly addresses MSW (municipal solid waste) fired CHP plants, either new plants or plants to be retrofitted in respect to combustion line and steam turbine. The environmental impact of the plant is given in table 2. In principle the utilisation of straw is CO2 neutral. The noise level is not significant, however, there is a slight smell at the plant due to the carbonisation process. Therefore future plants must be located in an industrial area. Table 2: Measured emissions Component Measurement Particles: 13 - 15 mg/Nm3 SO2: 160 -173 mg/Nm3 CO: 41 - 44 mg/NM3 O2 reference: 10 % 5. Economic Performance The total project cost including development and testing was 26 million DKK. The carbonisation demonstration plant was installed at a host plant at conditions which can not be considered optimum. The Haslev CHP plant has not been upgraded to take full advantages of the straw carbonisation unit which would allow to increase the pressure by 5-10 bar at higher steam temperatures, (however, a technical and economic evaluation of an eventual upgrading is under investigation). Therefore the economic performance of the Haslev CHP plant is not optimum. For new plants the pay-back period is estimated to be 6-9 years, which normally is acceptable for CHP plants. 6. Project Identifiers Project : BM/422/91-DK Owner : Haslev CHP Plant Contractors : ANSALDO VOLUND, COWI & ELKRAFT Contact: COWI Consulting Engineers & Planners AS Parallelvej 15, DK - 2800 Lyngby, Denmark Tel: +45 45 97 22 11, Fax: +45 45 97 22 12 Technology: ANSALDO VOLUND & COWI (patent holder of the carbonisation technology) Total Cost: 2,387,324 ECU EC Support: 704 728 ECU