Power Plant Engineering
1.1Introduction
Power plant engineering deals with the study of energy, its sourcesand utilization of energy for power generation. The power is generated byprime movers (example Hydraulic turbines, steam turbines, diesel engines).Large amount of power is generated using prime movers in a site or layoutcalled power plants, where all the equipments and machineries required forpower generation is located.Energy: Energy may be defined as the capacity to do work. Energyexists in various forms, such as Mechanical Energy, thermal energy,electrical energy, solar energy etc. Electricity is the only form of energy,which is easy to produce, easy to transport, easy to use and easy to control.Electricity consumption per capita is the index of the living standard peopleof a place or country i.e. the utilization of energy is an indication of thegrowth of the nation.
1.2 Power and Power Plant:
Power is primarily associated with mechanical work and electricalenergy. Therefore, power can be defined as the rate of flow of energy andcan state that a power plant is a unit built for production and delivery of aflow of mechanical or electrical energy. In a common usage, a machine orassemblage of equipment that produces and delivers a flow of mechanical orelectrical energy is a power plant. Hence an internal combustion engine is apower plant; a water wheel is a power plant, etc. However, what wegenerally mean by the term power plant is that assemblage of equipment,permanently located on some chosen site which receives raw energy in theform of a substance capable of being operated on in such a way as toproduce electrical energy for deliver from the power plant.
1.3 Sources of energy
The basic sources of energy for power generation are coal, oil, nuclearfuels and gas. These sources are known as “conventional sources of energy”. These sources of energy will one day be used up and are exhaustible. The most reassuring and promising energy, which is abundant insupply and is inexhaustible is “Non – conventional sources of energy” suchas solar, wind, tidal, geothermal etc.Energy resources can be broadly classified as follows
1
Energy Resources
Conventional sources of energy Non conventional sources of energy(Or)orNon – renewable sources of energyRenewable source of energy
Examples: -
Examples:-
Fuels like coal, oil, Sun, wind, waves, tides,energyNatural gas, nuclear fuels etc.From earth core, hydroelectricPower etc.
1.3.1 Non – renewable sources:
Most of the energy we use are from source like coal, oil, natural gasand nuclear fuels. These primary energy sources are called Non – renewablesources because once they have been used up, they cannot be replaced.
1.3.2 Renewable sources:
Sources of energy that can be used over and over again are calledrenewable sources. These sources can be used to produce electricity. Someof the renewable sources are:
•
Energy from the sun (Heat and light energy)
•
Energy from the wind (Kinetic energy)
•
Energy from the waves and tides (Kinetic energy)
•
Energy from earth’s core (Geothermal energy)
1.4 Classification of power plants
A power plant makes use of any one of the energy sources to producepower. Depending on the type of energy source the power plants areclassified as
•
Thermal power plant (It makes use of coal)
•
Internal combustion engine plants (makes use of petrol or diesel)
•
Gas turbine power plant (makes use of a permanent gas)
•
Nuclear power plant (makes use of nuclear fuels)
•
Solar power plant (makes use of the suns radiation heat)
•
Tidal power plant (makes use of the power of tides in the sea)
2
•
Hydro electric power plant (makes use of the potential energy of water)
•
Wind power (makes use of energy available in wind)
•
Geothermal power plant (makes use of heat energy available underthe ground)
1.5 Working principle of Steam power plants1.5.1 Introduction
Steam power plant is also known as Thermal power plant.A steam power plant converts the chemical energy of the fossil fuels (coal,oil, gas) into mechanical / electrical energy. This is achieved by raising thesteam in the boilers, expanding it through the turbines and coupling theturbines to the generators which convert mechanical energy into electricalenergy as shown in fig. 1.1. The following two purposes can be served by a steam power plant:1.To produce electric power2.To produce steam for industrial purposes besides producing electricpower. The steam may be used for varying purposes in the industriessuch as textiles, food manufacture, paper mills, sugar mills andrefineries.Fig. 1.1. Production of Electric energy by steam power plant
1.5.2 Classification of steam power plants
The steam power plants may be classified as follows:1.Central stations
3
of 00
Basic Mechanical Engineering - Power Plant Engineering
11,085 Reads
Info and Rating
| Category: | Uncategorized. |
| Rating: | |
| Upload Date: | 12/01/2009 |
| Copyright: | Attribution Non-commercial |
| Tags: |
Leave a Comment
thanks
thank you very much