Chapter Three

Steam Power Plant

3.1 Introduction
 Steam is an important medium of producing
mechanical energy.
 Steam has the advantage that, it can be raised from
water which is available in abundance
 It does not react much with the materials of the
equipment of power plant and is stable at the
temperature required in the plant.
 Steam is used to drive steam engines, steam turbines
etc.
 Steam power station is most suitable where coal is
available in abundance.
Essentials of Steam Power Plant Equipment
 A steam power plant must have following equipments
• A furnace to burn the fuel.
• Steam generator or boiler containing water, heat
generated in the furnace is utilized to convert water in
to steam
• Main power unit such as an engine or turbine to use the
heat energy of steam and perform work.
• Piping system to convey steam and water.
• In addition to the above equipment the plant requires
various auxiliaries and accessories.
Cont….
 A thermal power plant consists of the following four
main circuits:
 Feed water and steam flow circuit
 Coal and ash circuit
 Air and gas circuit
 Cooling water circuit.
Different types of systems and components
of steam power plant
 High pressure boiler
 Prime mover
 Condensers and cooling towers
 Coal handling system
 Ash and dust handling system
 Draught system
 Feed water purification plant
 Pumping system
 Control Room
 Switch yard
 Air preheater, economizer, super heater, feed heaters.
Selection of Site for Steam Power Plant
 Availability of raw material
 Cost of land
 Nature of Land
 Availability of water
 Transport facilities
 Ash disposal facilities
 Availability of labor
 Size of the plant
 Load center
 Future extension
 Public problem
Power Station Design
 Selection of site
 Estimation of capacity of power station.
 Selection of turbines and their auxiliaries.
 Selection of boilers, and their auxiliaries.
 Design of fuel handling system.
 Selection of condensers.
 Design of cooling system.
 Design of piping system to carry steam and water.
 Selection of electrical generator.
 Design and control of instruments.
 Design of layout of power station.
Characteristics of Steam Power Plant
 Higher efficiency.
 Lower cost.
 Ability to burn coal especially of high ash content, and
inferior coals.
 Reduced environmental impact in terms of air
pollution.
 Reduced water requirement.
 Higher reliability and availability.
3.2 Fuel Handling
 Three types of fuels can be burnt in any type of steam generating
plant.
 Supply of these fuels to the power plants from the various
sources is one of the important considerations for the power
plant engineer.
 The following factors should be considered in selecting the fuel
handling system.
 Plant fuel rate
 Plant location in respect of fuel shipping
 Storage area available
 Fuel handling plant needs extra attention, while designing a
thermal power plant station.
 Fuel system in designed in accordance with the type and nature
of fuel.
 Coal from the mining may be transported by:
 Sea or river
 Rail
 Rope ways
 Road
 Pipe line
 Requirements of good coal handling plant should be
 Need minimum maintenance
 Reliable
 Simple and sound
 Require a minimum of operatives
 Able to deliver requested quantity during peak hours
 Minimum wear due to abrasive action of coal particles
Coal Handling
 The various steps involved in coal handling are as
follows:
 Coal delivery
 Unloading
 Preparation
 Transfer
 Outdoor storage
 Covered storage
 In plant handling
 Weighing and measuring
 Feeding the coal into furnace.
3.3 Combustion Equipments and Firing Methods
Fuel Burning Furnaces

 Fuel is burnt in a confined space called furnace.

 The furnace provides supports and enclosure for burning
equipment.
 Solid fuels such as coal, coke, wood etc. are burnt by means of
stokers .
 burners are used to burn powdered (Pulverized) coal and liquid
fuels.
 Solid fuels require a grate in the furnace to hold the bed of fuel.
3.3.1 Types of Furnaces
 According to the method of firing fuel furnaces are classified into two
categories :
 Grate fired furnaces
 Chamber fired furnaces.
 Grate fired furnaces are used to burn solid fuels.
 They may have a stationary or a movable bed of fuel.
 These furnaces are classified as under depending upon the
method used to fire the fuel and remove ash and slag.
 Hand fired
 Semi-mechanized
 Stocker fired.
 Hand fired and semi-mechanized furnaces are designed with
stationary fire grates
 stoker furnaces with traveling grates or stokers.
Chamber fired furnaces
 They are used to burn pulverized fuel, liquid and gaseous
fuels.
 Furnace shape and size depends upon the following factors
 Type of fuel to be burnt.
 Type of firing to be used.
 Amount of heat to be recovered.
 Amount of steam to be produced and its conditions.
 Pressure and temperature desired.
 Grate area required.
 Ash fusion temperature.
 Flame length.
 Amount of excess air to be used.
 Furnace walls consists of an interior face of refractory
material such as
 Fireclay
 Silica
 Alumina
 Kaolin
 Diaspore
 An intermediate layer of insulating materials such as
magnesia with the exterior casing made up of steel sheet.
 Insulating materials reduce the heat loss from furnace but
raise the refractory temperature.
 Smaller boilers used solid refractory walls but they are air
cooled.
 In larger units, bigger boilers use water cooled furnaces.
 To burn fuels completely the burning equipment
should fulfill the following conditions :
 The flame temperature in the furnace should be high
enough to ignite the incoming fuel and air.
 Fuel and Air should be thoroughly mixed by it.
 The fuel burning equipment should be capable to
regulate the rate of fuel feed.
 To complete the burning process the fuel should remain
in the furnace for sufficient time.
 The fuel and air supply should be regulated to achieve
the optimum air fuel ratios.
 Coal firing equipment should have means to hold and
discharge the ash.
3.3.2 Methods of Solid Fuel Firing
 The solid fuels are fired into the furnace by the following
methods
 Hand firing
 Mechanical firing.
 Hand Firing
 It is a simple method of firing coal into the furnace.
 It requires no capital investment.
 It is used for smaller plants.
 This method of fuel firing is discontinuous process.
 They are simple in design
 Can burn the fuel successfully.
 Disadvantages
 Efficiency is low.
 Attending to furnace requires hard manual labour.
 Study process of fuel feed is not maintained.
Mechanical Firing (Stokers)
 They are commonly used to feed solid fuels into the
furnace in medium and large size power plants.
 advantages of stoker firing are :
 Large quantities of fuel can be fed into the furnace.
 Poorer grades of fuel can be burnt easily.
 Stoker save labour of handling ash and are self-cleaning.
 Better furnace conditions can be maintained by feeding coal
at a uniform rate.
 Stokers save coal and increase the efficiency of coal firing. The
 Main disadvantages
 More costs of operation and repairing resulting from high
furnace temperatures.
Principles of Stokers
 Overfeed Principle.
 The primary air enters the grate from the bottom.
 The air while moving through the grate openings
gets heated up and the grate is cooled.
 The hot air that moves through a layer of ash and
picks up additional energy.
 The air then passes through a layer of incandescent
coke where oxygen reacts with coke to form-CO2
and water vapours
 Additional air known as secondary air is supplied to
burn the combustible gases
 Underfeed Principle.
 Air entering through the holes in the grate comes in
contact with the raw coal.
 Then it passes through the incandescent coke where
reactions similar to overfeed system take place.

Overfeed Principle
Underfeed Principle
 Chain Grate Stoker
 Consists of an endless chain which forms a support for the
fuel bed.
 The chain travels over two sprocket wheels, one at the front
and one at the rear of furnace.
 The traveling chain receives coal at its front end through a
hopper and carries it into the furnace.
 The ash is tipped from the rear end of chain.
 It is used to burn lignite, very small sizes of anthracites
coke breeze etc.
 The stokers are suitable for low ratings because the fuel
must be burnt before it reaches the rear
Diagrams

Chain Grate Stoker.

Spreader Stoker
Spreader Stoker
 Hopper is fed on to a feeder which measures the coal
in accordance to the requirements.
 Feeder is a rotating drum fitted with blades.
 Feeders can be reciprocating rams, endless belts, spiral
worms etc.
 From the feeder the coal drops on to spreader
distributor which spread the coal over the furnace.
 Spreader system should distribute the coal evenly over
the entire grate area.
 The spreader speed depends on the size of coal.
Advantages Spreader Stoker
 Its operation cost is low.
 A wide variety of coal can be burnt easily by this stoker.
 Ash under the fire is cooled by the incoming air and this
minimizes clinkering.
 The fuel burns rapidly and there is little coking with
coking fuels.
 Disadvantages Spreader Stoker
 The spreader does not work satisfactorily with varying
size of coal.
 In this stoker the coal burns in suspension and due to
this fly ash is discharged with flue gases
3.3.3 Pulverized Coal
 Coal is pulverized (powdered) to increase its surface
exposure thus permitting rapid combustion.
 Efficient use of coal depends greatly on the combustion
process employed.
 For large scale generation of energy, the efficient method of
burning coal is confined still to pulverized coal combustion.
 The pulverized coal is obtained by grinding the raw coal in
pulverizing mills.
 The various pulverizing mills used are :
 Ball mill
 Hammer mill
 Ball and race mill
 Bowl mill.
Essential functions of pulverizing mills are
 Drying of the coal
 Grinding
 Separation of particles of the desired size.
 The coal pulverising mills reduce coal to powder form by
three actions.
 Impact
 Attrition (abrasion)
 Crushing.
 In impact type mills hammers break the coal into smaller
pieces
 In attrition type the coal pieces which rub against each
other or metal surfaces to disintegrate.
 In crushing type mills coal caught between metal rolling
surfaces gets broken into pieces.
Ball Mill
 It consists of a slowly rotating drum which is partly filled
with steel balls.
 Raw coal from feeders is supplied to the drum by means of
a screw conveyor.
 The air fed to the ball mill is heated in the air heater.
 In the separator dust (fine pulverized coal) is separated
from large coal particles which are returned to the ball mill
for regrinding.
 The dust moves to the cyclone.
 Most of the dust (about 90%) from cyclone moves to
bunker.
 The remaining dust is mixed with air and fed to the burner.
Ball Mill
Ball and Race Mill
 The coal passes between the rotating elements again and again.
 The coal is crushed between two moving surfaces namely balls
and races.
 The upper stationary race and lower rotating race driven by a
worm and gear hold the balls between them.
 The moving balls and races catch coal between them to crush it
to a powder.
 The necessary force needed for crushing is applied with the help
of springs.
 The hot air supplied picks up the coal dust as it flows between
the balls and races, and then enters the classifier.
 Oversized coal particles are returned for further grinding.
Cont..
 Coal is pulverized by a combination of' crushing,
impact and attrition between the grinding surfaces.
 The advantages of this mill are as follows :
 Lower capital cost
 Lower power consumption
 Lower space required
 Lower weight.
 However in this mill there is greater wear as compared
to other pulverizes.
3.3.4 Pulverized Coal Burners
 The main difference between the various burners lies in the
rapidity of air-coal mixing i.e., turbulence
 A pulverized coal burner should satisfy the following
requirements:
 It should mix the coal and primary air thoroughly and should
bring this mixture before it enters the furnace in contact with
additional air known as secondary air to create sufficient
turbulence.
 It should deliver fuel and air to the furnace in right
proportions and should maintain stable ignition of coal air
mixture and control flame shape and travel in the furnace.
 Coal air mixture should move away from the burner at a rate
equal to flame front travel in order to avoid flash back into the
burner.
 The flame shape is controlled by the secondary air vanes and
other control adjustments incorporated into the burner.
Types of Pulverized Coal burners
 Long Flame Burner (U-Flame Burner).
 Air and coal mixture travels a considerable distance thus
providing sufficient time for complete combustion
 Short Flame Burner (Turbulent Burner).
 The burner is fitted in the furnace wall and the flame enters
the furnace horizontally.
 Tangential Burner.
 In this system one burner is fitted at each corner of the
furnace.
 The inclination of the burner is so made that the flame
produced are tangential to an imaginary circle at the centre.
 Cyclone Burner.
 This burner uses crushed coal instead of pulverized coal.
 Its advantages are : It saves the cost of pulverization
 Problem of fly ash is reduced.
 Short Flame Burner
Long Flame Burner

Tangential Burner
Cyclone Burner
Oil Burners
 The function of oil burners are to mix the fuel and air in
proper proportion and to prepare the fuel for combustion.
 Classification of oil burners
1. Vaporizing of oil burners
 Atmospheric pressure atomizing burner
 Rotating cup burner.
 Recirculation burner.
 Wick type burner
2. Atomizing fuel burner
 Mechanical or oil pr. atomizing burner.
 Steam or high pr. air atomizing burner.
 Low pressure air atomizing burner.
3.4 Steam Generators
(Boilers)
3.4.1 Introduction to Steam Generator
 Generates steam at desired rate, desired pressure, and
temperature by burning fuel. It is a complex integration of
furnace, super-heater, reheater, evaporator, economizer, air
pre-heater, along with various auxiliaries such as
pulverizes, burners, stokers, dust collectors, ash-handling
equipment, chimney or stack. Thermal energy released by
combustion of fuel is transferred to water, which vaporizes
and gets converted into steam at the desired temperature
and pressure. The steam produced is used for:
 Producing mechanical work by expanding it in steam engine
or steam turbine.
 Heating the residential and industrial buildings
 Performing certain processes in the sugar mills, chemical and
textile industries.
A boiler should fulfill the following requirements
 Safety:-It should be safe under operating conditions.
 Accessibility:- The various parts of the boiler should be accessible for
repair and maintenance.
 Capacity:- It should be capable of supplying steam according to the
requirements.
 Efficiency:- To permit efficient operation, it should be able to absorb a
maximum amount of heat produced due to burning of fuel in the
furnace.
 It should be simple in construction and its maintenance cost should be
low.
 Its initial cost should be low.
 The boiler should be capable of quick starting and loading.
 The performance of a boiler may be measured in terms of its
evaporative capacity also called power of a boiler.
 It is defined as the amount of water evaporated or steam produced in
kg per hour.
3.4.2 Classification of Boilers
 Boilers can be classified according to the following criteria.
 According to flow of water and hot gases :
a) Water tube
b) Fire tube.
 According to position of furnace.
a) Internally fired
b) Externally fired
 According to the position of principle axis.
a) Vertical
b) Horizontal
c) Inclined.
Cont…
 According to application.
a) Stationary
b) Mobile (Marine, Locomotive).
 According to the circulating water.
a) Natural circulation
b) Forced circulation.
 According to steam pressure.
a) Low pressure
b) Medium pressure
c) Higher pressure.
Water Tube Boilers
 Water circulates through the tubes and hot products
of combustion flow over these tubes.
 More liable to explosion
 Produce higher pressure.
 Accessible and can response quickly to change in
steam demand.
 Tubes and drums of water-tube boilers are smaller
than that of fire-tube boilers.
 Requires lesser floor space.
 Efficiency is more.
Water tube boilers are classified as follows.

 Horizontal straight tube boilers

 Longitudinal drum
 Cross-drum.
 Bent tube boilers
 Two drum
 Three drum
 Low head three drum
 Four drum.
 Cyclone fired boilers
Advantages of Water Tube Boilers
 High pressure can be obtained.
 Heating surface is large therefore steam can be
generated easily.
 Large heating surface can be obtained by use of large
number of tubes.
 Because of high movement of water in the tubes the
rate of heat transfer becomes large resulting into a
greater efficiency.
Fire Tube Boiler
 Hot products of combustion pass through the tubes,
which are surrounded by water.
 Fire tube boilers have low initial cost and are more
compacts.
 Water volume is large and due to poor circulation they
cannot meet quickly the change in steam demand.
 For the same output the outer shell of fire tube boilers
is much larger than the shell of water-tube boiler
Classifications of Fire Tube Boilers
 External furnace:
 Horizontal return tubular
 Short fire box
 Compact.
 Internal furnace:
 Horizontal tubular
 Short firebox
 Locomotive
 Compact
 Scotch.
 Vertical tubular.
 Straight vertical shell, vertical tube
 Cochran (vertical shell) horizontal tube.
Advantages of Fire Tube Boilers
 Low cost
 Fluctuations of steam demand can be met easily
 It is compact in size.
3.4.3 Selection of a boiler
 While selecting a boiler the following factors should be
considered.
 The working pressure and quality of steam required.
 Steam generation rate.
 Floor area available.
 Accessibility for repair and inspection.
 Comparative initial cost.
 Erection facilities.
 Portable load factor.
 The fuel and water available.
 Operating and maintenance cost.
3.4.4 Boiler Terms
 Shell
 Setting
 Grate
 Furnace
 Water Space and Steam Space.
 Mountings
 Accessories
 Water level
 Scale
 Blowing off
 Lagging
 Refractory
3.4.5 Fire Tube Boilers
1)Cochran Boiler
 This boiler consists of a cylindrical shell with its crown
having a spherical shape.
 The grate is placed at the bottom of the furnace and the
ash-pit is located below the grate.
 The coal is fed into the grate through the fire door and ash
formed is collected in the ash-pit located just below the
grate and it is removed manually.
 The furnace and the combustion chamber are connected
through a pipe.
 The hot gases from the combustion chamber flow through
the rest of horizontal fire tubes .
 The passing through the fire tubes transfers a large portion
of the heat to the water by convection.
Cont..
 The flue gases coming out of fire tubes are finally.
discharged to the atmosphere through chimney.
 Coal or oil can be used as fuel in this boiler.
 If oil is used as fuel, no grate is provided but the bottom of
the furnace is lined with firebricks.
 Oil burners are fitted at a suitable location below the fire
door.
 A manhole near the top of the crown of shell is provided
for cleaning.
 In addition to this, a number of hand-holes are provided
around the outer shell for cleaning purposes.
 The outstanding features of this boiler are
 It is very compact and requires minimum floor area.
 Any type of fuel can be used with this boiler.
 It is well suited for small capacity requirements.
Cochran Boiler
Locomotive Boiler
 Locomotive boiler is a horizontal fire tube type mobile boiler.
 The main requirement of this boiler is that it should produce
steam at a very high rate.
 Therefore, this boiler requires a large amount of heating surface
and large grate area to burn coal at a rapid rate.
 It consists of a shell or barrel of 1.5 meter in diameter and 4
meters in length.
 The cylindrical shell is fitted to a rectangular firebox at one end
and smoke box at the other end.
 The coal is manually fed on to the grates through the fire door.
 A brick arch deflects the hot gases, which are generated
due to the burning of coal.
Cont..
 The deflection of hot gases with the help of brick arch prevents
the flow of ash and coal particles with the gases and it also helps
for heating the walls of the firebox properly and uniformly.
 The deflection of hot gases also helps in igniting the volatile
matter from coal.
 The ash-pit, which is situated below the firebox to control the
flow of air to the grate.
 The hot gases from the firebox are passed through the fire tubes
to the smoke box as shown in the figure.
 The gases coming to smoke box are discharged to the
atmosphere through a short chimney with the help of a steam
jet.
 All the fire tubes are fitted in the main shell.
Cont..
 The outstanding features of this boiler are
 Large rate of steam generation per square meter of
heating surface.
 It is free from brickwork, special foundation and
chimney.
 It is very compact.
 The pressure of the steam is limited to about 20 bar.
3.4.6 Water Tube Boilers
3.4.7 High Pressure Boilers
Benson Boiler
 Benson in 1922 raised boiler pressure to critical pressure
(225 bar)
 The steam and water have the same density and therefore
the danger of bubble formation can be easily eliminated
 The water as passed through the economizer into the
radiant evaporator (Majority of water converted into
steam)
 The remaining water is evaporated in the final evaporator
absorbing the heat from hot gases by convection
 The saturated high-pressure steam (at 225 bar) is further
passed through the super-heater
 The maximum working pressure obtained in Benson boiler
is 500 bar
 The Benson boilers of 150 tones/hr generating capacity are
in use