Advanced Sensors and Control Requirements for Multi-Burner Pulverized Coal-Fired Boilers

A.J. Zadiraka Babcock & Wilcox Barberton, Ohio, U.S.A. Presented to: ISA Cleveland Symposium June 3 - 5, 1996 Cleveland, Ohio, U.S.A. BR-1612

Key Words
Pulverized Coal, Boilers, Control, Sensors.

Abstract
As the 21st century begins, it is anticipated that the U.S. will require new generating plants to meet the growing demand for electricity and to replace aging plants approaching the end of their useful life. For coal to be the fuel of choice, new coal-fired plants will have to be extremely clean, efficient and economical. Advances in emission control techniques resulting in reduced costs and auxiliary power requirements combined with significant efficiency gains from steam turbine and cycle design clearly show that pulverized coal technology can be competitive in both cost and performance. Babcock & Wilcox, under contract to the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), is leading a team in the development of an advanced generating plant in DOEs Combustion 2000 program entitled Engineering Development of Advanced Coal-Fired Low Emission Boiler System (LEBS). This program combines advanced environmental control technologies capable of achieving emissions of SOx, NOx and particulate far below current New Source Performance Standards (NSPS) with an advanced boiler equipped with improved combustion and heat transfer subsystems for net plant efficiencies exceeding 40%. Maintaining these performance requirements over a wide load range with load changes at rates of 5%/minute will require application of advanced sensors and controls to these units. One of the fundamental control requirements is the need to maintain optimum combustion conditions in the boiler over the units load range, during load changes as well as at steady load conditions. As part of the Combustion 2000

program, sensors and control techniques are being developed to permit the accurate measurement and control of the individual burner air and fuel flows as they are introduced to the time-temperature-turbulence combustion process in the furnace.

Background
In 1995, 1,200 Utility owned coal-fired units supplied 323 GWe, 43.9% of the total domestic electrical generating capacity. By the year 2005, over half of these coalfired units, representing 74 GWe of capacity, will have been in service for more than 40 years. Even though most of the net increase in domestic generating capacity will come from oil- and gas-fired units, Table 1 shows that net generation from coal-fired units will increase by 2005 and will continue to represent 41.5% of the nations generating capacity. As this decade started, the advanced coal-fired power plants of the future were expected to be based on the Pressurized Fluidized Bed Combustion (PFBC) and Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (IGCC) technologies. However, advances made in emission control and ultrasupercritical steam cycle technologies clearly indicate that pulverized coal technology will be cost and performance competitive with these advanced coal plants for at least the early part of the next century. In the world wide market, where U.S. suppliers are now competing, the demand for new coal-fired generating capacity is tremendous. Countries which have the greatest need for additional generating capacity, such as China, can least afford the higher costs of first-of-a-kind designs or the associated performance risks associated with the advanced coal plants. Even in Europe and Japan, where stringent emissions requirements or high fuel costs can

Babcock & Wilcox

Table 1 Electrical Generating Capacity in the U.S. Fuel Coal Gas/Oil Other Totals 1995 Total Generating Capacity 322,946 MWe 225,442 MWe 201,252 MWe 749,639 MWe Percent of Total Capacity 43.9 30.1 26.0 100.0 2005 Total Generating Capacity 326,875 MWe 258,268 MWe 203,179 MWe 788,322 MWe Percent of Total Capacity 41.5 32.8 25.7 100.0

Source: DRI/McGraw-Hill World Energy Service, U.S. Outlook Spring-Summer 1995 from Tables 65 & 78

justify the advanced coal-firing technologies, pulverized coal-fired plants with ultra-supercritical steam cycles are being constructed. Combustion 2000 In recognition of the world wide competitive potential for advanced pulverized coal-fired systems, the DOEs Pittsburgh Energy Technology Center began a research and development initiative in late 1990 in order to preserve and expand coal as a principal fuel for the generation of electric power. This program, named Combustion 2000, involves two stages of commercialization, the Low Emission Boiler System (LEBS) to address the near term and the High Performance Power System (HIPPS) for the longer term. Babcock & Wilcox (B&W), under contract to DOE, is leading one of the three industry teams working on the LEBS portion of the program. The LEBS program is divided into four phases spanning seven years. Phase I, which ran from 1993 to 1994, involved system analysis, R&D planning and component definition to provide a preliminary Commercial Generating Unit (CGU) design. Phase II, which is currently in progress, involves pilot and subsystem testing to confirm and refine the conceptual designs developed in Phase I. In Phase III, a design will be developed for a Proof-of-Concept (POC) demonstration facility as well as refining the design of the CGU based on the findings from Phase II. Phase IV will involve the construction and extended operation of the POC facility to prove the readiness of the technology for commercial use. The B&W teams activities in Phase I were structured around four major subsystems; NO x Control, SOx Control, Boiler, and Balance of Plant (BOP). During Phase I, the importance of integrating the sensors and controls across the four subsystems in order to meet the performance goals was recognized and a Controls & Sensors subsystem activity was established at the start of Phase II. The Phase I design to meet the programs performance goals is an ultra-supercritical 4500 psi 1100/1100/1100 F dry bottom boiler integrating advanced low NOx combustion with deep staging, advanced pulverizers providing ultra-fine pulverized coal and Limestone Injection Dry Scrubbing (LIDS). A simplified gas side arrangement of this design is shown in Figure 1.

The goals of the program have been continually refined since the start of the program in 1993. The current performance goals are no more than 0.1 lb/MBtu NOx, 0.1 lb/MBtu SOx and 0.005 lb/MBtu particulate with a net plant efficiency of at least 42% while reducing solid wastes and being in compliance with anticipated air toxics regulations for a plant that is at or below the cost of a conventional NSPS plant.

NOx Control

One of DOEs program requirements is to achieve the low NOx emission levels through the combustion process rather than with a back end NOx removal processes. Significant burner development is required to design advanced low-NO x burners which can be operated deeply staged (0.75 stoichiometry). To maintain the low NO x emissions achieved by these advanced burners over the operating range and during high rates of load changes requires the application of advanced sensors and controls to achieve precise regulation of the combustion conditions. One of the key areas being investigated in Phase II is the development of sensors and control techniques to permit the accurate measurement and control of the individual burner air and fuel flows as they are introduced to the timetemperature-turbulence combustion process in the furnace. In order to meet the NOx emission goal, a target was established to limit the deviation between the air-to-fuel ratio or stoichiometry of individual burners to 3% over the load range. While the capability to monitor the individual burner air flows is incorporated into current lowNO x burners, as shown in Figure 2, their application in on-line control has been limited by the inability to provide corresponding measurement of the individual burner coal flows. Phase II activities to address these deficiencies involve both measurement of the individual burner stoichiometry using flame signature analysis and sensors to determine coal flows to the individual burners. Sensor development testing will occur during coal burner tests that are being done as part of the Combustion 2000 LEBS program. This testing will be performed in the Clean Environment Development Facility (CEDF) at B&Ws Alliance Research Center. The CEDF is a large scale combustion test facility with a heat input capacity of 100 million Btu/hr. This facility permits testing of a full scale burner or multi-burner operation with small scale burners. A process flow diagram of the CEDF is shown in Figure 3.

Babcock & Wilcox

Limestone Feeder

Dry Scrubber Transport Blower Air Heater

Baghouse ID Fan Stack FD

Coal Feeder

PA Recycle Solids Bin Blowdown H2O Solids to Landfill

H2O

Pulverizer Recycle Solids Tank

Detention Slaker

Figure 1 LEBS commercial generating unit.

Flame Signature Analysis Starting in Phase I, work was begun to evaluate if the power spectrum analysis being used by commercially available flame detectors to improve flame discrimination could be extended to identify individual burner fuel-toair ratios, NOx or unburned carbon. This approach offered the advantage of not requiring the installation of any additional sensors on the individual burners. Figure 4 shows power spectrums observed in a test tunnel on a 5 MBtu/hr coal burner operating with optimized settings compared to operating conditions near the burners stability limit. Linear analysis of optical flame detector
Air Measurement Adjustable Adjustable Pitot Grid Inner Vanes Outer Vanes Sliding Air Damper

sensors power spectrum from testing early in Phase II showed that a set of quality factors could be identified for a burner test series that produced promising correlation to NOx but that the quality factors often required recalibration between test series. After an extensive review, the quality factors linear analysis of the flame signal was abandoned in favor of an approach based on both linear and nonlinear evaluation using techniques from chaotic time series analysis, such as mutual information, phase-space trajectory analysis, correlation integral, correlation dimension, entropy and method of surrogates. Data was obtained during testing

Sliding Air Damper Drive

Burner Elbow

Primary Air/ Pulverized Coal Conical Diffuser

Burner Nozzle Flame Stabilizing Ring

Figure 2 B&W PC-fired low NOx DRB-XCL burner.

Figure 3 Clean Environment Development Facility.

Babcock & Wilcox

Power, V2

on the data points represent the calculation error estimated from repetitive calculation of the entropy. While the results to date are optimistic and the flame signals can be used to monitor and control burner air-tofuel ratios, future work is planned to verify and validate that nonlinear analysis techniques can be extended to multi-burner environments.

Entropy (Actual)/Entropy (Random)

Linear Fit

Frequency, Hz

Figure 4 Burner power spectrum.

of both 5 MBtu/hr and 100 MBtu/hr burners using visible light sensors sighted at several points along the length of the burner flame and static pressure sensors on the primary air/coal line supplying the burner and secondary air duct to the burner. Analysis of this data indicated that the nonlinear techniques generally provided better resolution of differences between operating conditions. Figure 5 shows a plot from phase-space trajectory analysis, referred to as an attractor in CHAOS theory, of the same data set shown as a power spectra in Figure 4.

Test Conditions 5 MBtu/hr PA Coal = 1.80 O2 = 3.5%

Burner Stoichiometry

Figure 6 Burner non-linear analysis results.

Coal Flow Measurement

While the coal flow into a pulverizer can be accurately monitored, the distribution of the coal flow between the 2 to 12 burners typically supplied from a pulverizer has not been readily measurable. The coal is pneumatically conveyed to the burners at a velocity of 50 to 75 ft/sec with a solids loading of 0.2 to 0.5 lb solids/lb air and is subject to a roping effect with the solids distribution in a crosssection of the burner line being neither uniform nor stable. The burner coal flow also lags the coal flow into the pulverizer due to the recirculating load or storage in the pulverizer that is necessary to achieve the required sizing and drying of the coal particles. A new storage level must be achieved for every load change on the pulverizer as well as for changes in the grindability, moisture content and particle size distribution of the coal feed before the coal flow leaving the pulverizer matches the coal flow into the pulverizer. Microwave Flow Monitor Initial efforts in Phase II centered on evaluating a new commercially available microwave flow sensor, the Endress + Hauser Granuflow GMR 130. The operating principle, illustrated in Figure 7, of this sensor uses the Doppler frequency shifted reflected energy to measure the solids concentration. This sensor was evaluated on the B&W Alliance Research Centers Air/Particulate Flow Facility. This facility, with its ambient temperature transport air and flexible transparent piping configuration, is used for investigation of two-phase (gas/solids) transport. To provide a safe simulation of pulverized coal, an inert material, with the same size distribution and density, was used to simulate pulverized coal flow characteristics.

Optimized Burner Conditions

Stability Limit Conditions

Figure 5 Burner phase-space trajectory.

The analysis also found that the best correlation with the burner air-to-fuel ratio or stoichiometry was obtained from the entropy calculation using data from the visible light sensor looking at the burner throat where the initial combustion occurs. Entropy indicates the predictability of a system. A higher entropy indicates a higher unpredictability. A typical result for entropy analysis is shown in Figure 6 where normalized or relative entropy is plotted against burner stoichiometry for a test series. The relative entropy is determined by dividing the entropy of the measured data by the entropy of an equivalent set of random data. Relative entropy can range from a value of 0.0 for completely predictable behavior to 1.0 for totally unpredictable or stochastic behavior. The error bars shown

Babcock & Wilcox

Process Flow

Reflective Energy

The Kurtz sensor was inserted through a 1/2 inch compression fitting welded on the sight glass used to mount the GMR 130 microwave sensor as shown in Figure 9. Evaluation of the Kurtz sensor showed that it was linear and repeatable of the velocity ranges tested and that it was insensitive to the solids loading. Additional evaluation of the GMR 130 sensor showed repeatability with data taken without the Kurtz probe installed. The combination of the two sensors provides the capability to calculate the solids mass flow (pounds of solids per hour) in the burner line. Further work will include testing on a pulverized-coal burner line during coal burner tests that are being conducted as part of the LEBS program on the CEDF.

Transmitted Energy GMR 130 Flow Flow 4 7/8 in. Sight Glass 22

4 in.

Figure 7 GMR 130 operating principle.

Kurz Flow Meter

The GMR 130 sensor was installed on a sight glass mounted on the 12 inch ID pipe at the outlet of a 90 degree elbow to take advantage of the fairly stable rope effect (see Figure 8) that occurs at the exit of a bend with dilute-phase transport. The evaluation of this sensor showed that it can measure the concentration (pounds of solids per cubic feet of air) in a dilute-phase transport system typical of a pulverized coal burner line.

7 3 / i n . 16
18 in. R

Flow 12 in. ID Flow

No

Figure 9 facility.
Yes No Roping Effect

Coal flow sensor installation on air/particulate flow

Figure 8 Roping in dilute-phase transport.

Since the primary or transport air flow in a burner line can vary independent of the coal flow in a burner line, efforts were initiated to identify sensors which could determine the air flow in the burner line. A Kurtz Series 450 insertion mass flow sensor was evaluated in combination with the GMR 130 on the Air/Particulate Flow Facility. The Kurtz sensor uses a 1/2 inch diameter thermal probe that responds to changes in velocity over a heated element. The operating principal is based on a constant temperature anemometer with RTDs used for measuring the reference and process temperatures.

Acoustic Emission Monitor During the evaluation of different approaches to monitoring coal flow, it was hypothesized that the intensity of structure-borne acoustic waves generated through the impact of pulverized coal particles with the burner line could be used to monitor coal flow. This technology, often referred to as acoustic emission (AE), would monitor the coal particles impacting a burner splash plate or sliding along the outer radius of a bend in the burner-coal line. To investigate the feasibility of this technique, a fourchannel B&W ALL (Acoustic Leak Locator) system with 150, 300 and 750 kHz structure-born AE sensors was installed on the burner line as shown in Figure 10. Data from these sensors was collected during coal burner tests being conducted on the CEDF. Analysis of the data showed the best results were obtained from the sensors mounted on the burner splash plate where direct impact of the coal particles occurs. While the average of the data sets taken at steady loads showed good correlation with coal flow, significant jitter was

Babcock & Wilcox

observed as indicated in Figure 11. The AE signal was insensitive to changes in burner line velocity. Poor correlation of the AE data with coal feed rate during start-up and shutdown of the burner was observed for the limited data that was obtained during these conditions. Further investigation is planned to establish if a limiting factor exists with the AE concept or if a problem exists in the feeding of pulverized coal with a gravimetric belt feeder.
Holddown Clamp AE Sensor Coal Flow Coal Flow To Burner Nozzle Waveguide Splashplate

Advanced Control Development

One of the requirements identified in Phase I of the LEBS program as necessary to meet the goals of the program was that the resulting LEBS system would have to be tightly controlled as an integrated system. While the sensor development activities focused on the needs of the NOx subsystem, development of operating procedures and advanced control philosophies are needed to meet the performance goals during load changes and equipment startup and shutdown. To support the development of the required control philosophies, a dynamic model of the POC facility is being developed to permit their testing and evaluation prior to their application to the actual POC facility. This dynamic model provides full simulation of the POC system including the control system and final elements. Simplifying the modeling effort is the fact that the POC facility does not include the water-steam cycle that exists with the CGU. The dynamic model of the POC incorporates the boiler, flue gas cleanup equipment, controls and other auxiliary equipment that affect the overall system performance. The complex physical processes of combustion, heat transfer, and emissions formation and reduction are being modeled to represent the ultimate performance of the POC system. The actual POC furnace is modeled by a separate standalone program, referred to as the Combustion and Emissions Module (CEM). The CEM is derived from the multidimensional numerical modeling of radiative heat transfer and chemical kinetics for the flue gas stream being performed as part of the LEBS program. The CEM is interfaced with the remainder of the process modules which represent the POC and its control systems and are being implemented using SPEEDUP dynamic simulation software. As data comes available from Phase II activities of the other LEBS subsystem teams, it is used to refine the performance of the dynamic model. Acknowledgments The author would like to thank the U.S. Department of Energys Pittsburgh Energy Technology Center for its support of the Combustion 2000 LEBS program.

Burner Line Elbow

Burner Splash Plate

Figure 10 Installation of acoustic emission sensors on CEDF.

AE 750 KHz Sensor, Volts

Coal Feed Rate, lb/hr

Figure 11 Acoustic emission data.

References

1. McDonald, D.K., Madden, D.A., Sivy, J.L., B&Ws Advanced Coal-Fired Low-Emission Boiler System; Preparation for and Preliminary Results of Subsystem Testing, 21st International Technical Conference on Coal Utilization & Fuel Systems, Clearwater, Florida, March 18-21, 1996. 2. Johnson, S.A., Senior, C.L., Khesin, M., Zadiraka, A.J., Advanced Instrumentation for the B&W Low Emission Boiler, EPRI/EPA NO x Symposium, Kansas City, May 1995.

3. Fuller, T.A., Flynn, T.J., Daw, C.S., Halow, J.S., 1993, Interpretation of Pilot-Scale, Fluidized Bed Behavior Using Chaotic Time Series Analysis, Proceedings of the 12th International Conference on Fluidized Bed Combustion, p. 141-154. 4. Watson, G.B. and Geis, M.J., On-Line Measurement of Pulverized Coal Flow, Power-Gen Americas 95, Anaheim, California, December 5-7, 1995.

Babcock & Wilcox