Future Power Stations Research Articles

Group Technology Applied in Quality Management System

This paper is based on a company that manufactured the nuclear power components. This paper Studies the quality management that aimed at characteristics of multi specification and small batch production. The components which are produced at this company have been used in new energy field. Quality of nuclear power components can meet the technical requirements or not is very important to the operation and safeguard of nuclear power station in future. Group technology combined with statistical process control technology and applied in the quality management system to analyze the testing data of each working procedure in multi-kind and small-quantity production to achieve the goal of improve and control the quality of the product.

Assessment of postcombustion carbon capture technologies for power generation

A significant proportion of power generation stems from coal-combustion processes and accordingly represents one of the largest point sources of CO2 emissions worldwide. Coal power plants are major assets with large infrastructure and engineering units and an operating life span of up to 50 years. Hence, any process design modification to reduce greenhouse gas emissions may require significant investment. One of the best options to utilize existing infrastructure is to retrofit the power station fleet by adding a separation process to the flue gas, a practice known as postcombustion capture (PCC). This review examines the recent PCC development and provides a summary and assessment of the state of play in this area and its potential applicability to the power generation industry. The major players including the various institutes, government, and industry consortia are identified along with flue gas PCC demonstration scale plants. Of the PCC technologies reviewed, amine-based absorption is preeminent, being both the most mature and able to be adapted immediately, to the appropriate scale, for power station flue gas with minimal technical risk. Indeed, current commercial applications serve niches in the merchant CO2 market, while a substantial number of smaller scale test facilities are reported in the literature with actual CO2 capture motivated demonstrations now commencing. Hybrid membrane/absorption systems, also known as membrane contactors, offer the potential for the lowest energy requirements, possibly 10% of current direct scrubbers but are at an early stage of development. Other methods being actively pursued as R&D projects include solid absorbents, solid adsorbents, gas membrane separators, and cryogenic separation. The variety and different maturities of these competing technologies make technical comparison largely subjective, but useful insights could be gained through the development and application of econometric techniques such as ‘real options’ within this context. Despite these limitations, it is clear from this review that amine scrubbing is likely to be adapted first into the existing power station fleet, while less mature technologies will grow and become integrated with the development of future power stations.

Geological processes that control lateral and vertical variability in coal seam moisture contents—Latrobe Valley (Gippsland Basin) Australia

A study throughout the Latrobe Valley coal measures of coal moisture distribution using downhole bore data and 3D digital models of large bore data sets indicates lateral and vertical moisture variability is controlled by a number of factors. These include burial, type of overburden, age of the seam, marine influence, coal lithotype and lateral compression on folds and monoclines. The same rules appear to apply to the adjacent Alberton coal measures in the south Gippsland Basin, suggesting these factors may be widespread in other brown coal basins where moisture contents are still equilibrating through differential compaction. In Gippsland average moisture down seam decreases by 1–2% per seam and at a rate of approximately 1% every 20 m. Weight average moisture content for each seam decreases on average at a rate of 0.5% every 1 million years. A stepwise decrease in moisture content between the ∼100 m thick major seams of 1–7% reflects large intervals of time are represented by the relatively thinner (1–10 m thick) interseam sediments. Compression by monoclinal folding can decrease moisture contents up to 7%. For any given depth, moisture content appears higher on anticlines due to a lowered intensity of compression than in adjacent synclines. It is considered likely that coals folded over anticlines are more fractured, thereby containing greater amounts of free water. Use of the lower moisture coals and monoclinal coals may be preferable for future power station developments. Despite an increase in overburden/coal ratios, there would be significant savings in a lowered coal volume to calorific value, and a consequent reduction in greenhouse gas emission.

Design goals and status of the WENDELSTEIN 7-X project

WENDELSTEIN 7-X (W7-X) is a helical advanced stellarator(HELIAS) which produces the necessary twist of the plasma columnonly by magnet coils which enable steady state operation. W7-Xaims to demonstrate that the HELIAS configuration is a viablealternative for a future power station. Major research anddevelopment activities have meanwhile been completed. Theseinclude the design of a machine sufficiently well advanced to allow the coilsystem to be manufactured, the power supplies to be ordered andthe cryostat to be specified. The geometry and configuration ofthe non-planar magnet coils have a considerable impact on thedesign of the machine, in particular on the shape of the plasmavessel, the positioning of the plasma-facing components and theports. The requirement for steady state operation hasconsequences for most of the subsystems of W7-X. The magnetcoils are superconducting and must be cooled to 3.8 K by ahelium refrigeration plant. The power supply for the magnetcoils features a reliable protection system dumping the storedmagnet energy in case of a rapid shutdown. The water-cooleddivertor must be designed for heat loads of up to 10 MW m-2. ECRH, ICRH and NBI will provide the necessary power to heat theplasma.

New Zealand's unique blend of emissions mitigation and sinks enhancement policies

New Zealand government policy combines CO 2 absorption by newly planted forests with various means to address gross emissions, including voluntary CO 2 emission reduction agreements. Emissions per unit production for coal using sectors are 25% lower from improvements made in the last 10 years and there are many more cost effective opportunities. The requirement of full mitigation of CO 2 emissions from a future power station is a shift away from the government's “no regrets” policy and is premature in the absence of a national policy statement.

On the structure of the inshore fish community of England and Wales

Records of fish captures on power station intake screens were used to analyse the structure of the English and Welsh inshore fish community. The study was undertaken as part of a programme to predict fish captures at future power station sites. It was found that 118 of the 122 fish species known to live inshore were recorded from the screens of 12 coastal power stations. The maximum number of species at one site was about 80, achieved at fully marine localities along the English Channel coast. This number declined with increasing latitude and decreasing salinity.Fish subdivide their use of the inshore habitat both spatially and temporally and the proportion of species complement within the major subdivisions of the habitat was remarkably similar at all sites. On average, 28 species were present simultaneously and these would include 4 pelagic, 8 demersal and 16 benthic species.

Costs of nuclear accidents Implications for reactor choice

In this article the economic consequences of nuclear accidents are expressed as a surcharge on the capital costs of each new station. An accident at any nuclear station may cause electric power utilities elsewhere to reduce output from the same type of reactor, as happened after Three Mile Island. The size of the accident surcharge therefore increases with the worldwide use of a reactor type. Plausible assumptions for the UK give a surcharge of 7.5% of total capital costs for the pressurized water reactor (PWR), compared to 2.5% for a lesser-used design such as the advanced gas-cooled reactor (AGR). These results are subject to considerable uncertainty but they clearly indicate that the accident surcharge could be of some importance in the choice of reactor for future power stations.

Damping in Turbine Blade Alloys

Abstract Measurements of the damping capacity Q−1 of candidate turbine blade alloys for the Wairakei, New Zealand geothermal power station and other future power stations are reported. The techniques used were the piezoelectric ultrasonic composite oscillator technique (PUCOT) at 40 or 80 kHz and stress levels 70 kPa to 37 MPa and the vibrating reed technique (VRT) at 321 Hz and stress levels 32 to 177 MPa. Specimen materials investigated were Ti-6A1-4V, 26Cr-1Mo steel, Firth-Vickers (United Kingdom) FV520B steel, 15Cr-Mo steel, and 410 (Unified Numbering System [UNS] S41000) stainless steel. The results include Young's modulus and the stress and strain amplitude dependences of Q−1. The frequency dependence of Q−1 was found to be only a few tens of percent, much smaller than the predicted dependence. Of the two techniques, it was shown that the VRT is more suited to damping measurements at the operational stress levels for turbine blades. The PUCOT, VRT, and high stress cyclic stress-strain data were plotted on a universal curve of damping energy versus stress. The plot covers 14 orders of magnitude in damping energy and five orders in stress.

Utilization of Solar Energy

From a Point of View of energy crisis in the world, the background and necessities for development of solar energy are explained, and then the development of solar power generation is recommend.At first, the feasibility, sub-systems, total-system, economics and technical problems ofsolar thermal power station are reported. then, the view of typical solar thermal power station in future are shown.At last, the out line of satellite solar power station which is planning in NASA, U.S.A. are explained, and the technical and economical consideration for satellite solar power station are given.

The Problem of Cuba's Energy Supplies

AbstractIn view of the limited natural resource base, imported oil is expected to remain the principal energy source. Peat extracted from the Zapata swamps is envisaged as a future power-station fuel. The present status and future plans of electric-power development are described, and five power-consumption districts are delimited.

The United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority and its functions

The United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority has three main groups: research, industrial and weapons. The Research Group carries out research and development directly relating to civilian application of atomic energy. The Industrial Group designs and operates factories for the production of uranium metal and the fissile materials uranium 235 and plutonium. It has also a design office for the design of pioneering type of nuclear power stations. The Industrial Group has also a Research and Development Branch which carries out experimental research into the operational problems of the factories and into specific development problems of new plant and nuclear power stations. The nuclear power programme of the future requires the development of new types of power stations as successors to the gas-cooled graphite-moderated power stations which are now to be constructed by industry in successively improved marks. The Research and Industrial Groups together explore the different possible types of future power stations and are carrying out design studies on the most promising types. During the last year, for example, a design study on the pressurized-water reactor has been carried out in collaboration with industry and the Central Electricity Authority (C.E.A.). The comparative merits of this and other possible Stage-2 reactors are now being assessed. At the same time longer-range work is carried out on still more advanced reactors such as the homogeneous reactor and the fast reactor. This work combines with zero-energy reactor physics studies and is followed by construction of an experimental reactor. Each new reactor requires the development of specific technologies, particularly in the development of appropriate fuel elements and associated chemical-processing facilities for spent fuel elements. This development requires an intensive testing programme of reactor components, particularly fuel elements, and the Authority is now building three heavy-water research and fuel-element-testing reactors to speed up such testing. These reactors require associated heavily shielded and remote-handling facilities for examining the highly radioactive components. These expensive central facilities are likely to continue to be provided by the Authority. Also it seems likely that fuel-element fabrication and chemical-processing facilities will be held by the Authority. Industry will take an increasing share of the research and development work and construction work for reactors and nuclear power stations, and the pattern of co-operation is being worked out by experience. The Research Group is responsible for the production and application of radioactive isotopes and radiation. These applications are growing rapidly, at a rate of about 25% a year, and it is expected soon to have very powerful sources of radiation available for industrial processes. The Research Group also looks to the future and carries out research and long-term projects of importance to future developments.