How Does A Steam Turbine Work?

A steam turbine, as we see from its name, uses steam to rotate its blades. The rotary motion of the blades is used to rotate the armature of the generator, and the movement of the armature in a magnetic field results in the production of a current (electricity) in the armature! The steam turbine has come a long way from its initial design: there is the single flow steam turbine, the multiple flow steam turbine, the reaction steam turbine, the impulse-reaction steam turbine, and the impulse turbine. It has been the object of research and interest of many engineers and scientists like De Laval, Parson, and Curtis. Heat energy from a coal thermal power plant or a nuclear power plant is used to boil waiter, and convert it into steam at high pressure. This high pressure steam is directed to the turbine blade thus causing the blade to rotate!

How Does An Impulse Turbine Work? The impulse turbine was one of the basic steam turbines. It involved striking of the blades by a stream or a jet of high pressure steam, which caused the blades of the turbine to rotate. The direction of the jet was perpendicular to the axis of the blade. It was realized that the impulse turbine was not very efficient and required high pressures, which is also quite difficult to maintain. The impulse turbine has nozzles that are fixed to convert the steam to high pressure steam before letting it strike the blades.

How Does a Reaction Turbine Work? A reaction turbine also rotates its blades due to the impending pressurized steam, but the steam does not strike the blades perpendicular, as in an impulse turbine. The steam is directed to flow along the blades, thus causing the blades to rotate because of the reaction force more than the impulse force. The reaction turbine has a nozzle design that is incorporated on its blades itself, thus reducing space

and making it more compact, as no fixed nozzles were required. The only constraint here was that the design of the nozzles on the blades was a bit complicated; otherwise, the reaction turbine was a straight winner. Friction was reduced and it was easily more efficient than its impulse counterpart. In the reaction turbine, the rotor blades themselves are arranged to form convergent nozzles. This type of turbine makes use of the reaction force produced as the steam accelerates through the nozzles formed by the rotor. Steam is directed onto the rotor by the fixed vanes of the stator. It leaves the stator as a jet that fills the entire circumference of the rotor. The steam then changes direction and increases its speed relative to the speed of the blades. A pressure drop occurs across both the stator and the rotor, with steam accelerating through the stator and decelerating through the rotor, with no net change in steam velocity across the stage but with a decrease in both pressure and temperature, reflecting the work performed in the driving of the rotor. Reaction turbines and water wheels, a type of turbine, are very efficient machines. Because of their unique design, maximum energy is extracted from the flowing stream. This leads to offshoot advantages, such as improved power transfer to pulleys or grinding stones. In 2011, all turbines are reaction, since other types of turbines are inefficient and antiquated technology Read more: Advantages of Reaction Turbine Design | eHow.com http://www.ehow.com/info_10013915_advantages-reaction-turbinedesign.html#ixzz1s58v3oqq

How does an Impulse Reaction Turbine Work? The impulse reaction turbine, a combination of the aforementioned designs, was a turbine whose blades rotated because of both, the impulse force of direct thrust on the blades by the steam, as well as the guiding thrust on the blades because of

the unique blade design of the reaction turbine. Therefore, the efficiency of this turbine surpassed that of both the above, and it stood out from all its predecessors. There was a pressure drop in both, the fixed blades (nozzles) of the impulse design, and in the moving blades (that were nozzle shaped), therefore effectively rotating the blades, and producing more electrical energy per rotation! Most steam turbines today use this design for effective power conversion and electricity generation.

Back-pressure Turbines

Condensing Turbines

Back-pressure turbines expand high-pressure steam through a turbine. The output steam is exhausted at a relatively low pressure suitable for onsite heat requirements. It is possible to release the steam at various points through the turbine allowing access to more than one grade of heat; the extraction of steam from the turbine will result in a decrease in power across the blades. Backpressure steam turbines have traditionally been the most popular generation technology for CHP.

In a condensing turbine, steam is exhausted into a condenser, achieving maximum possible pressure drop across the blades. The condensing steam turbine thus generates more electricity from a given quantity of highpressure steam than a backpressure turbine, but then wastes all of the thermal energy. Central plants, with no economic possibility of transmitting by-product heat to remote thermal users, utilize condensing steam turbines.

Advantages and Disadvantages

Advantages
High

Disadvantages
Low electrical efficiencies; Need for expensive high-

overall cogeneration efficiencies of up to 80%; A wide range of possible fuels including waste fuel and biomass; An established technology; Production of high temperature/pressure steam.

pressure boilers and other equipment; Slow start up times; Poor part load performance.

A gas turbine, also called a combustion turbine, is a type of internal combustion engine. It has an upstream rotating compressor coupled to a downstream turbine, and a combustion chamber in-between.
Advantages of gas turbine engines Very high power-to-weight ratio, compared to reciprocating engines; Smaller than most reciprocating engines of the same power rating. Moves in one direction only, with far less vibration than a reciprocating engine. Fewer moving parts than reciprocating engines.

Low operating pressures. High operation speeds. Low lubricating oil cost and consumption. Disadvantages of gas turbine engines Cost is much greater than for a similar-sized reciprocating engine since the materials must be stronger and more heat resistant. Machining operations are also more complex; Usually less efficient than reciprocating engines, especially at idle. Delayed response to changes in power settings.

These disadvantages explain why road vehicles, which are smaller, cheaper and follow a less regular pattern of use than tanks, helicopters, large boats and so on, do not use gas turbine engines, regardless of the size and power advantages imminently available. Energy is added to the gas stream in the combustor, where fuel is mixed with air and ignited. In the high pressure environment of the combustor, combustion of the fuel increases the temperature. The products of the combustion are forced into the turbine section. There, the high velocity and volume of the gas flow is directed through a nozzle over the turbine's blades, spinning the turbine which powers the compressor and, for some turbines, drives their mechanical output. The energy given up to the turbine comes from the reduction in the temperature and pressure of the exhaust gas. Energy can be extracted in the form of shaft power, compressed air or thrust or any combination of these and used to power aircraft, trains, ships,generators, or even tanks.

A wind turbine is a device that converts kinetic energy from the wind into mechanical energy. If the mechanical energy is used to produce electricity, the device may be called a wind generator or wind charger. If

the mechanical energy is used to drive machinery, such as for grinding grain or pumping water, the device is called awindmill or wind pump. Developed for over a millennium, today's wind turbines are manufactured in a range of vertical and horizontal axis types. The smallest turbines are used for applications such as battery charging or auxiliary power on sailing boats; while large grid-connected arrays of turbines are becoming an increasingly large source of commercial electric power.

the advantages of wind turbines are that they produce electricity. They are green in operation if not manufacture. The disadvantages are that the power they produce may be less then the power required to build one. They can be a navigation issue for some low flying planes. The most significant problem is the number of birds and bats that are killed annually. Massachuttes alone estimates that their wind turbines kill over 100,000 birds and bats annually. Questionable issues include the fact they are subjectively an eye sore, they are expensive to build and run and the power is variable. This inability to produce consistent power makes the running of less efficient power systems (normally fossil fuel) required. This means that there is no carbon reduction.

Small wind turbines are wind turbines which have lower energy output than large commercial wind turbines, such as those found in wind farms. These turbines may be as small as a fifty watt generator for boat, caravan, or miniature refrigeration unit. Small units often have direct drive generators, direct current output, lifetime bearings and use a vane to point into the wind. Larger, more costly turbines generally have geared power trains, alternating current output and

are actively pointed into the wind. Direct drive generators are also used on some large wind turbines.