Ways for Improving Efficiency and Reliability of Steam Turbines at Nuclear Power Stations

Abstract

The current state and ways for improving the effectiveness of steam turbine units at nuclear power stations (NPS) are examined. The specifics of NPS turbines is described. The comparison of NPS steam turbine performance with the performance of steam turbines at thermal power stations (TPS) demonstrates that power units of NPSs are much poorer in effectiveness due to relatively low steam conditions at the inlet and the presence of wet steam already in the first stages of turbines. A decrease in the relative internal efficiency of NPS turbines results from the enhanced negative effect of wetness in the expansion process: in modern NPS turbines, more than two-thirds of the heat drop is spent in the two-phase region, while less than one fourth in TPS turbines. It is demonstrated that the effectiveness of NPS steam turbine units can be increased drastically in the future only through a considerable rise in the turbine inlet steam conditions. This can be achieved by using a heat carrier at supercritical conditions in the NPS reactor. The dependence of the effectiveness of NPS modern turbines on the turbine inlet steam conditions in the applicable pressure ranges of the saturated steam and vacuum in the condenser, as well as on the turbine exhaust area, is examined. For a 1000 MW turbine, increasing the inlet pressure from 6.0 to 8.0 MPa raises the turbine power and efficiency by 3.5%. At a condensing turbine outlet pressure ranging from 2.5 to 7.5 kPa and a constant velocity downstream of the last stage, the turbine power and efficiency can be increased by 7%. The importance of the exhaust area for the turbine effectiveness is revealed. Alternative designs of the flowpath in a low-pressure cylinder are analyzed. A unique configuration of a steam turbine unit with two-stage moisture separation is proposed. The comparison of high-speed turbines with low-speed ones was performed. It is demonstrated that the efficiency of the examined turbines is nearly the same within the accuracy of design calculations and the test results, and it is slightly higher for low-speed turbines due to lower losses with outlet velocity.