Condensing technology choice

[EMSOGI]

Dear all,
I have to make a comparative analysis between two condensing solutions for a 400MW power plant:
- Water condenser with cooling tower
- Air cooled condenser
The analysis should take into account all the aspects:
- Power Plant Efficiency
- Investment costs
- Equipment differences
- Utilities consumptions (costs)
- Water availability
- Environmental impact (CT Plume)
- Any other pertinent aspect that can drive the choice

Does anyone of you have experience of such analysis? Could you suggest any references for similar studies?

Thanks in advance and Regards

lottol

 

[Chris0164]

Hi Lotto,

I don't know what you are up to but condensing water with a cooling tower I never did. We often use it for cooling down plant water but can never be less that the wet bulb temperature. To give you some figures, we have just purchase a 56 MW concrete cooling tower with CW from 31.9 to 25 ° C with 19 °C wet belb, 7000 m³/hr for about 650 kEuro (exclusive piling and the concrete part) Four 24 feet 7 bladed low noise fans with each 110 kW e-motor. Cooling water tower needs two 650 kW vertical turbine pumps 120 kEuro each.

Hope this helps you a bit more doing the evaluation. If you want I can look up some figures about the piling and concrete.

Kind Regard,

Chris

 

[rmw]

You need to contact some vendors for each type of equipment and give them some actual or assumed operating conditions and parameters.

Their proposals will contain many of the answers you are seeking.

Others, such as CT plume are intangibles and depend upon factors that you did not present.

Dry cooling towers are normally used where there is a paucity of water or where CT plume is problematic. If a CT will otherwise suffice they are usually the more expensive option.

rmw

 

[thermcool]

For the cooling tower versus the air cooling.
Comparison have revealed that:
The cooling tower are good from the point of view of that they save energy as compared to the same extent of cooling by air cooling and additionally they are best for water saving. As the extent of the water used up for the cooling purpose decreases by the use of cooling tower.

On the other side, the cooling tower require periodic maintenence and cleaning so as to avoid any consequences of the legionallsis (bacteria that is formed at around 25 tp 45 C in the wet atmosphere).

Possible investment cost is more for cooling tower but the return are more than the air cooling. They are of course, more efficient.