Power Plant Modeling – Restart with Confidence – Lower Risk Emissions Control Revamp

摘要

Today's new emissions control systems are very complex, challenging E&C firms with their design and construction, as well as owner/operators with their control, operation, and maintenance. In this case, the nearly 50 year old, North American sited, coal-fired plant was about to receive a major new emissions control system. The plant operations and engineering teams wanted to understand the operation of this new equipment, as the cost of a single day of lost production would be $200 to $400 thousand dollars. Avoiding any unplanned outages was a critical concern. A team was assembled with members from the plant, the E&C firm, and a US-based process control engineering firm. They worked to create a model-based, dynamic simulation of the plant with the new equipment and ran a number of simulation cases. They tested various startup and shutdown sequences, plant cycling, as well as a number of disturbances and trip conditions. They then used this data to create the control logic and operating procedures long before the equipment was even installed. We will discuss the model setup, execution, data output analysis, and best-practices developed.