Heat-rate improvements obtained by retubing condensers with new, enhanced tube types
- Argonne National Lab., IL (United States)
- Consulting Services, Virginia Beach, VA (United States)
Significant fuel savings can be achieved at power plants by retubing the condensers with enhanced tubes. Because of the higher overall heat-transfer coefficient, the exhaust steam is condensed at a lower pressure and the plant efficiency is therefore increased or plant heat rate is reduced. Only the spirally indented type of enhanced tube is currently being used in the U.S. and most other countries; however, different types of enhanced tubes have been proposed for power-plant condensers, each with their own set of attributes. This paper determines what attributes and their magnitudes of enhanced tubes lead to the most energy savings as measured by reduction of the plant heat rate. The particular attributes considered are the inside and outside enhancement levels, the inside efficiency index (inside enhancement level divided by pressure-drop increase), and the enhanced-tube fouling-rate multiplier. Two particular condensers were selected because all necessary information were known from previous heat-rate studies such as the condenser geometry, the circulating-water pump and system information, and the low-pressure turbine characteristics. These are {open_quotes}real-world{close_quotes} condensers and therefore the finding will be representative for many other condenser-retubing applications. However, the authors strongly recommend that an economic evaluation be performed at each site to determine the energy savings and payback time. This generic investigation showed that the outside enhancement level is the most important attribute, and a value of about 1.5 can lead to heat-rate savings of about 20 to 40 Btu/kW-hr. Increasing the inside enhancement is less effective because of the increased pressure drop that leads to a reduction of the coolant flow rate and velocity.
- Research Organization:
- Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE, Washington, DC (United States)
- DOE Contract Number:
- W-31109-ENG-38
- OSTI ID:
- 10107239
- Report Number(s):
- ANL/ES/CP-83413; CONF-941142-28; ON: DE95004509; TRN: 95:000995
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: American Society of Mechanical Engineers` winter annual meeting,Chicago, IL (United States),6-11 Nov 1994; Other Information: PBD: [1995]
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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