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DESIGN AND THERMODYNAMIC ANALYSIS OF STEAM POWER PLANT WITH

REGENERATOR

Article · February 2021

DOI: 10.6084/m9.figshare.13718056

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Applied Thermodynamics
DESIGN AND THERMODYNAMIC ANALYSIS OF
STEAM POWER PLANT WITH REGENERATOR

Md Walid Faruque
Department of Mechanical and Production Engineering
Introduction
A station thermal power is a power plant in which the prime mover is steam driven. Water is
heated, turns into steam and spins a steam turbine which drives an electrical generator. After
it passes through the turbine, the steam is condensed in a condenser and recycled to where it
was heated; this is known as a Rankine cycle. The greatest variation in the design of thermal
power stations is due to the different fossil fuel resources generally used to heat the water. Some
prefer to use the term energy center because such facilities convert forms of heat energy into
electrical energy. Certain thermal power plants also are designed to produce heat energy for
industrial purposes of district heating, or desalination of water, in addition to generating
electrical power.
To achieve better energy production and low environmental impact, an accurate
thermodynamics analysis of thermal system and optimisation of the system are required. In this
regard, there are two essential tools available such as energy analysis (referring to the 1st law of
thermodynamic analysis) and exergy analysis (referring to the 2nd law of thermodynamic
analysis). Exergy analysis has become a key aspect in providing a better understanding of the
process, to quantify sources of inefficiency, to distinguish quality of energy used.
In this report a steam power plant with regenerator is thoroughly discussed and the calculation
of 1st law and 2nd law efficiencies are discussed. The main goal of this report is to show the
generation of 130 MW electricity. At the end of this report the result is shown in a table.

Thermodynamic description of a steam power plant with regenerator

A rankine cycle is the simplest power plant cycle for steam power plant. The disadvantage of a
simple ranking cycle is that it has lower efficiency based on 2nd law of analysis. Although a
simple rankine cycle has higher efficiency than gas power cycle but still rankine cycle can higher
efficiency in both 1st and 2nd law with some modifications. Figure-1 shows a schematic
diagram of a steam power plant with regenerator.
The working principle of this cycle is very simple. Water gets boiled at boiler and it is passed to
the HPT and the send back to the boiler for reheating and the low-pressure steam is send to
the LPT. So here two turbine work outputs are achieved. After LPT the steam is sent to the
condenser and the steam is cooled down. At LPT steam is divided into two portions, one goes
to the regenerator for preheating the water before water goes to the boiler through pump-2.
And other portion of the steam is gone through the condenser for continuing the loop.
Although the cost of this type of system is higher than a simple rankine cycle and gas-powered
cycle but the efficiency is comparably higher than those other two. So, from economic point of
view is cycle is justified and cost of this cycle is calculated in the calculation sector. Also, size of
this type of plant is much higher than the simple rankine cycle. This cycle can be used as
combined cycle with gas turbine.
In order to calculate the performance of the SPPR, some assumptions were taken. But for taking
the assumptions it was taken in note that those assumption cannot be taken such a way that the
shown cycle in figure-1 becomes close to ideal condition of the operation. Those assumptions
are:
• The cycle is operating at its peak condition. That means the calculation was done
considering that the SPPR is operating at its best condition.
• All the pressure drops in the pipe section are negligible.
• Smooth pipes (almost zero friction) are taken as consideration.
• Effectiveness and efficiency of the condenser (heat exchanger) were not considered
rather they were calculated by assuming the fluid temperature.
• LMTD method is used for heat exchanger equation.
• State 5 and 6 were considered as saturated vapor and saturated liquid.
After taking those consideration a calculation was conducted based on some input parameters.
The thermal modeling and the calculation were conducted on MATLAB and the properties of
the fluid were taken by using CoolProp. Equations which were using for thermal analyzing
are given below: (table-1)
Table 1: The balance equations for system components
Components Energy Analysis Exergy Analysis
HPT WHPT=h1-h2 RED=(h1-h2)-T0*(s1-s2)
LPT WLPT=h3-x*h4-(1-x)*h5 RED=(h3-x*h4-(1-x)*h5)-T0[s3-x*s4-(1-x)*s5]
FWH X=(h8-h7)/(h4-h7) RED = -T0 [x*s4+(1-x) *s7-s8]
Condenser mcw=(1-x)*(h5-h6)/hco-hci RED= - T0[(1-x)*(s5-s6)+mcw*(sci-sco)
Boiler mg=[(h1-h9)+(h3- RED=- T0[(s9-s1)+(s2-s3)+mg(sg1-sg2)]
h2)]/(Cp*(Tg2-Tg1))
Pump 1 wp1= (1-x)*(h7-h6) RED=(1-x)*[(h6-h7)-T0*(s6-s7)]
Pump 2 wp2= h9-h8 RED=(h8-h9)-T0*(s8-s9)
Boiler Heat QH= mg*[(h1-h9)+(h3- Same as boiler
h2)]

After calculating those parameters 1st law and 2nd law efficiency can be calculated.
Wtotal =WHPT+WLPT and q= (h1-h9) + (h3-h2)
ŋɪ = Wtotal / q; ŋɪɪ=w/RED;

Cost Analysing
The total cost of the system includes initial investment costs plus the operating costs over the
15 year operating period of the plant. The initial costs of the power devices (turbines and
pumps) are dependent on their power levels, and the initial costs of the heat transfer equipment
are dependent on their physical size (which is related to the mass flow rate of the working fluids
that pass through them). The cost of a power plant is normally depended on fuel cost, initial
cost and operating cost.
The fuel costs are given as:
• Fuel Cost: $3.8 per million BTU
• Purchased Power: $0.12/kW-hr
• Sold Power: $0.035/kW-hr
• Maintenance Costs: 5% of initial costs per year of operation.
Initial Costs can be calculated by the following equations:
Terms Equations
Turbine = $260 * (WHPT + WLPT )
Pump = $2,400 * (wp1+ wp2)
Boiler = $135,000 * m
Condenser = $46,000 * ((1-x)* m ̇ )
Feed water =$52,000 * ((1-x)* m ̇ )
Total Initial Cost Turbine + Pump + Boiler + Condenser + Feed water

Operating costs can be calculated by the following equations:

Terms Equations
Maintenance Total initial cost * 15
Fuel = (3.8*107/293.07107) * QH * (365.25) * (24) * (15)
EP(effective power) = shaft_eff*( WHPT + WLPT) – (wp1+ wp2)
Power brought = (2800 - EP ) * (0.12) * (365.25) * (24) * (15)
Power sold =(EP - 2800) * (0.035) * (365.25) * (24) * (15)
Total Operational Maintenance + Fuel + Power brought +Power sold
Cost
Total Cost Total Initial Cost + Total Operational Cost

Analysing the size of the power plant

Turbines under 200 MW are normally designed to have only 2 stages of expansion. But to
calculate the size of a steam power plant one has to consider each component. Here total five
types of components (turbine, pump, boiler, generator and condenser) are used.
1. Assumptions for turbine sizing
Terms Values
Reynolds Number 0.5*106 to 15*106
Mach Number 0.25 to 0.60 (HPT as 0.20-0.25 and LPT as 0.5-0.8)
Index of compression Average 1.3
Discharge coefficient 0.4-0.6
Stage loading 0.8-4.0
 Flow inlet angle 20-25o
Blade Inlet angle 40-45o

2. Boiler Sizing
There is a thumbs up rule to calculate boiler room size needed for the power plant. And it is
shown as a graph by the USA market. In this report that graph was used to calculate boiler
room size.

Figure 2: Boiler size vs Minimum boiler room.

3. Generator Sizing
In this report hybrid diesel engine (DGen) was considered for producing electricity. The
synchronous diesel engine is connected to an IGBT/Diode operated AC-DC converter to
maintain the voltage level at the DC bus when the engine is generating power. The operation
of the generator side converter is controlled using a similar control scheme applied for
controlling the switching mechanism of the GSC (grid side converter) connected to the FESS
(flywheel energy storage system). Fuel consumption of the generator depends on the load that
is required at a certain time. This fuel consumption is given in a graph format by the
international market only for hybrid DGen.
 Figure 3.Diesel engine fuel consumption relative to the load.

4. Condenser Sizing
Condenser is one type of special heat exchanger. In condenser saturated vapor converts into
saturated liquid. There are different size and types of heat exchangers are used in power plant.
As the generated power is less than 200 MW shell and tube type heat exchanger can be used.
And to determine its size some assumptions and conditions were taken. Those assumptions and
conditions were:
• Functions: Condense vapors by removing the latent heat of vaporization.
• Operation: Continuous
• Tube Side: Cold Water, flow rate will be calculated by heat rejection method, 14.7 psia
pressure, temperature will be calculated by LMTD method.
• Shell Side: Steam, flow rate will be calculated by 1st law efficiency, condensation
pressure in thermodynamic calculation, condensation temperature in thermodynamic
calculation.
5. Pump Sizing
In any pumping system, the role of the pump is to provide sufficient pressure to overcome the
operating pressure of the system to move fluid at a required flow rate. The operating pressure
of a pumped system is calculated in the SI unit of meters (m). To maintain dimensional
consistency, any pressure values used within the calculations are therefore converted from kPa
into m using the following conversion;
1 kPa = 0.102 m (as measured by a water filed U tube manometer).
And mass flow rate was converted from kg per second (kgs-1) to gallon per minute (GPM). And
from international chart, 1kgs-1=15.85 GPM. And after calculating flow rate using chart, the
required pump sizes were considered. The velocity of the water was assumed 10fts-1 and
centrifugal type of pump was considered.

Results and Discussion

1. Thermodynamic Perspective
First a sample hand calculation was done by taking some constant parameters. After
successfully calculating the 1st and 2nd law efficiency; that calculation procedure was converted
into a MATLAB code and to know the property, CoolProp was used in both hand calculation
and code solving.
The Parameters that were taken constant initially were:
P1=12 MPa; T1=500°C; P2=P3=2.4MPa; T3=500°C; P5=P6=7 KPa; T5=39°C; P4=P7=
P8=0.15 MPa Turbine Efficiency=0.9; Flue gas inlet: P= 102Kpa; T=1500°C; Flue gas inlet:
P= 101Kpa; T=400°C; Dead state temperature, To =25°C; and initial state of the flue gas as
the reference state.

Figure 4: Effect of boiler pressure on 1st and 2nd law efficiency

Figure 4 shows the change of 1st law efficiency with respect to boiler pressure. It shows that
1st law efficiency increases while increasing boiler pressure but it has to be noted that the
pressure cannot be increased infinitely. Increasing pressure means larger and better efficient
boiler which has to be economically justified. The graph was plotted in Origin Pro plotting
software by taking the values obtaining from the code. The code is shown in the appendix.

Figure 5: Boiler pressure vs mass flow rate.

The sample calculation was done for mas flow 1kgs-1. And for 1kgs-1 total turbine output was
1.48MW. So to obtain 130 MW the required mass flow rate will be 92.367 kgs-1. Similarly
for different boiler pressure total turbine workout is different and mass flow rate will be different
too. Figure-5 shows the mass flow rate with respect to boiler pressure. From the figure-5 it
can be seen that mass flow rate decreases with respect to increase of boiler pressure.

2. Economic Perspective

Figure 6&7: Boiler pressure vs Costs

From figure 6&7 it can be seen that with the increase of boiler pressure, total capital or initial
cost increases but the operational cost for a 15 years duration’s decreases. As the boiler pressure
increases, turbines and boiler’s capital cost also increases but operating cost decreases due to
power bought and power sold perspective.

General Idea of the Size of Power Plant

1. Turbine Size
Based on the assumptions taken previously a table of turbine size was taken for USA market.
The size may not be exactly correct for the proposed power plant as this size was taken based
on market availability.
Table 2: Typical geometric factors of steam turbine blades under 200 MW
Parameters HPT LPT
Bare rotor dia, mm 962 962
Length of cylinder 3.5-4.0 6.5-7.5
No of stages of blades 10-14 Double flow: 4-8
Blade height 34-100 370-770
Blade dia (max), mm 1200 2600
Aspect ratio of blades 1-2 3-5
No of fixed blades 64-72 48-54
No of moving blades 168-256 92-124
Blade pitch, mm 10-30 40-70

2. Generator Size
As mentioned before DGen engine was considered for this proposed cycle as it has highest
efficiency for low amount of generating electricity. Based on the assumptions taken previously
a table of turbine size was taken for USA market. The size may not be exactly correct for the
proposed power plant as this size was taken based on market availability.
Table-3: Typical generating factors of DGen (Synchronous)
Parameters Values
Nominal power 15 kW
Line to line voltage 380 V
Rated frequency 50 Hz
Number of poles 4
3. Boiler Size
Boiler size is directly proportional to the amount of heat is converted to steam. From
thermodynamics’ perspective boiler size is depended on QH. From thermodynamics’
perspective a graph was generated for different boiler pressure vs heat added (QH). Based on
that heat addition boiler size was calculated. Following graph shows the heat addition with
respect to boiler pressure. And from that graph, boiler size for 12 MPa was considered from
the previous mentioned graph. It is roughly 12,440 m2.

Figure 8: Boiler pressure vs Heat added at boiler.

4. Condenser Size
Based on the assumptions taken previously a table of turbine size was taken for USA market.
The Size may not be exactly correct for proposed power plant as this size was taken based on
the market availability.
Specification Sheet Condenser
Tube Side Tubes: 0.75 in dia.
Number of tubes: 1030 tubes in each 16 ft.
long Passes: 04
Triangular pitch: 23.8 mm
Pressure drop: 0.59 psia.

Shell side Shell: 39 in dia.

Passes: 1
Baffles spacing: 3.5 in
Pressure drop: 0.103 psia.
Pump size was not calculated as the author could not find any specific equation or chart to
calculate exact or estimated value. There was only a thumbs up rule that was mentioned in the
previous section.
The overall calculation of the proposed system was done according to book and data available
in the USA market. However maybe all of them is not accurate. But they are close to accurate.
 Appendix
Thermodynamics’ Perspective Code:
Function Code:
function [FirstEff,SecondEff,totalMass]= DincinOutput (P1)
import py.CoolProp.CoolProp.PropsSI
%point-1
P1=P1*10^6;
T1=500+273.16;
H1=PropsSI('H','T',T1,'P',P1,'Water');
S1=PropsSI('S','T',T1,'P',P1,'Water');
%point-2
P2=2.4*10^6;
effHPT=0.9;
H2S=PropsSI('H','P',P2,'S',S1,'Water');
H2=H1-effHPT*(H1-H2S);
S2=PropsSI('S','P',P2,'H',H2,'Water');
%point-3
P3=P2;
T3=500+273.16;
H3=PropsSI('H','P',P3,'T',T3,'Water');
S3=PropsSI('S','P',P3,'T',T3,'Water');
%point-4
P4=0.15*10^6;
effLPT=0.9;
H4S=PropsSI('H','P',P4,'S',S3,'Water');
H4=H3-effLPT*(H3-H4S);
S4=PropsSI('S','P',P4,'H',H4,'Water');
%point-5
P5=7*10^3;
effLPT=0.9; H5S=PropsSI('H','P',P5,'S',S3,'Water');
H5=H3-effLPT*(H3-H5S);
S5=PropsSI('S','P',P5,'H',H5,'Water');
%point-6
P6=P5;
 H6=PropsSI('H','P',P6,'Q',0,'Water');
S6=PropsSI('S','P',P6,'Q',0,'Water');
%point-7
P7=P4;
effPump=0.9;
H7S=PropsSI('H','P',P7,'S',S6,'Water');
H7=H6+((H7S-H6)/effPump);
S7=PropsSI('S','P',P7,'H',H7,'Water');
%point-8
P8=P4;
H8=PropsSI('H','P',P8,'Q',0,'Water');
S8=PropsSI('S','P',P8,'Q',0,'Water');
%point-9
H9S=PropsSI('H','P',P1,'S',S8,'Water');
H9=H8+((H9S-H8)/effPump);
S9=PropsSI('S','P',P1,'H',H9,'Water');
%% calculation
x=(H8-H7)/(H4-H7);
w=(H1-H2)+(H3-x*H4-(1-x)*H5);
w=w/1000;
q=(H1-H9)+(H3-H2);
q=q/1000;
FirstEff=w/q;
massGas=q/(Cp*(tempGasIn-tempGasOut));
RED=massGas*(-aGasOut+aGasIn);
SecondEff=w/RED;
totalMass=(130*1000)/w;

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