Evaluation of Sorbent Injection for Mercury Control
The power industry in the U.S. is faced with meeting new regulations to reduce the emissions of mercury compounds from coal-fired plants. These regulations are directed at the existing fleet of nearly 1,100 boilers. These plants are relatively old with an average age of over 40 years. Although most of these units are capable of operating for many additional years, there is a desire to minimize large capital expenditures because of the reduced (and unknown) remaining life of the plant to amortize the project. Injecting a sorbent such as powdered activated carbon into the flue gas represents one of the simplest and most mature approaches to controlling mercury emissions from coal-fired boilers. This is the final site report for tests conducted at DTE Energy's Monroe Power Plant, one of five sites evaluated in this DOE/NETL program. The overall objective of the test program was to evaluate the capabilities of activated carbon injection at five plants: Sunflower Electric's Holcomb Station Unit 1, AmerenUE's Meramec Station Unit 2, Missouri Basin Power Project's Laramie River Station Unit 3, Detroit Edison's Monroe Power Plant Unit 4, and AEP's Conesville Station Unit 6. These plants have configurations that together represent 78% of the existing coal-fired generation plants. The goals for the program established by DOE/NETL were to reduce the uncontrolled mercury emissions by 50 to 70% at a cost 25 to 50% lower than the target established by DOE of $$60,000/lb mercury removed. The results from Monroe indicate that using DARCO{reg_sign} Hg would result in higher mercury removal (80%) at a sorbent cost of $$18,000/lb mercury, or 70% lower than the benchmark. These results demonstrate that the goals established by DOE/NETL were exceeded during this test program. The increase in mercury removal over baseline conditions is defined for this program as a comparison in the outlet emissions measured using the Ontario Hydro method during the baseline and long-term test periods. The change in outlet emissions from baseline to long-term testing was 81%.
- Research Organization:
- Ada Environmental Solutions
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE
- DOE Contract Number:
- FC26-03NT41986
- OSTI ID:
- 902845
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
Similar Records
Evaluation of Sorbent Injection for Mercury Control
Evaluation of Sorbent Injection for Mercury Control