The condensing steam cycle is shown diagrammatically in Figure 22.8.

The fuel is fired in a

boiler which converts the heat released from combustion to steam at high pressure and
temperature. This steam is then expanded through a turbine for generation of electrical power.

Exhaust steam from the turbine is condensed in a heat exchanger and then returned via the feed
pumps to the boiler. The associated Rankine Cycle is illustrated in Figure 22.9.

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The efficiency of the cycle, ignoring work done by the boiler feed pumps, is given by change in
enthalpy as follows:

Efficiencyundefined=(h1-h2)(h1-h3)

and h1 to h2 represents the ideal isentropic expansion process in the turbine. However, in
practice, because of irreversibilities, this is less than unity.
This efficiency can be improved by the use of a feed heating cycle whereby bled steam can be
taken from the turbine after certain stages of expansion and then used to raise the feedwater
temperature via use of feed heat exchangers. By such means the feedwater temperature, before
entry to the boiler, is increased, thereby increasing the efficiency as the bled system is condensed
by transfer of heat to the working fluid within the cycle, so reducing condenser heat rejection.

Large power stations use complex feed heating systems before the boiler feed pumps (LP) and
after the boiler feed pumps (HP) which can give high overall thermal efficiencies of 39%.
However, for the smaller machine it becomes uneconomic to consider multiple bleeds from the
turbine, and the final choice is dictated by the extra cost for the additional complexity against
lower running costs due to increased efficiency. As a minimum, a contact type de-aerator is often
employed which would extract a small bleed of around 2–3 bar from the turbine.
4 Modelling the steam power plant
Mathematical modeling of the steam cycle is based on conservation of mass and energy
principles. Eq.(1) and Eq.(2) describes the mass and energy balance respectively.