Guidelines for control and prevention of fly ash erosion in fossil fired power plants. Final report
- ABB Combustion Engineering, Windsor, CT (United States). Power Plant Labs.
- ABB Combustion Services Div., Gloucester, ON (Canada)
Boiler tube failures (BTF`s) due to fly ash erosion are one of the leading single causes of availability loss in fossil boilers. The damage, which can be very localized, has led to expensive and lengthy forced outages. As part of an overall BTF reduction program, EPRI has documented the available solutions being applied for fly ash erosion. Unfortunately, most of these are regarded as temporary fixes that do not provide long term solutions. A technique applied in Canadian and Australian utilities has provided long term solutions on the order of ten years. This technique has been demonstrated now at two US utilities under an EPRI sponsored project, (RP2711-2). The result of the project is a guideline that outlines, step-by-step, activities for stepping up and running an erosion control program at a utility boiler. The heart of the program is the cold air velocity test (CAVT), done in the convective pass at ambient conditions. With the fans running, one or more two-man teams measure gas flows entering and/or leaving pendants and banks. These data and a boiler assessment are used to identify operating conditions conducive to fly ash erosion. Flow control screens are then selected and installed to redistribute fly ash, reduce gas velocities and produce acceptable erosion rates. The result should be long term relief from boiler tube failures caused by fly ash erosion. The program cost is estimated to be $300--$400/MW depending on unit design, operating characteristics and extent of fly ash erosion.
- Research Organization:
- Electric Power Research Inst., Palo Alto, CA (United States); ABB Combustion Engineering, Inc., Windsor, CT (United States). ABB Power Plant Labs.; ABB Combustion Services Div., Gloucester, ON (Canada)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- Electric Power Research Inst., Palo Alto, CA (United States)
- OSTI ID:
- 10135553
- Report Number(s):
- EPRI-TR-102432; ON: UN94008774
- Resource Relation:
- Other Information: PBD: Feb 1994
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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