Study of Supercritical Coal Fired Power Plant Dynamic Responses for Grid Code Compliance

A. Gil-Garcia[1], I. Kings[1], B. Al-Duri[1]
[1]University of Birmingham, School of Chemical Engineering, Edgbaston, Birmingham, UK
Published in 2014

In clean coal technologies, improving energy conversion efficiency is one of the most important directions. Compared to traditional subcritical power plants, pressure-increased supercritical power plants improve the plant energy efficiency from 35% up to 45%. This work presents a study of the thermodynamic behaviour of the water cycle in coal-fired boilers in response to the changes in energy demands.

Simulation-based research using COMSOL Multiphysics® software will be focused on the forced convection of supercritical water inside a heated pipe. The heat transfer coefficient will be evaluated in response to sudden changes in water conditions such as pressure, heat flux or mass flux, and thermal efficiencies.

As a result, the best working conditions from a thermodynamic point of view will be identified.