Abstract
As distributed generation moves from concept to reality, industrialand institutional steam customers are realizing that they can often usesteam turbine/generator technology in their existing steam networks tomake “opportunistic” electric power and significantly reduce their an-nual energy costs. Historically, turbines operating in this “backpressure”mode have been assumed to have a net fuel-to-electric efficiency that isapproximately equivalent to the on-site steam boiler, because every unitof energy removed as electricity must be replaced with a unit of heat.Under this assumption, backpressure turbine/generators easily becomethe most efficient power generation technology ever invented. While thislogic is thermodynamically true, it often breaks down in practice, wherethe nuances of steam plant operation make it possible to generate elec-tricity at an even higher efficiency with backpressure turbine/generators.In some cases, the power produced by backpressure turbine/generatorsis actually free.
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