Steam Center Blog

Steam power plants are here to stay. Even if the heat source is nuclear the power plant is still a steam type. At the present time the thermal efficiency of steam power plants is limited by the fact that turbines cannot handle steam beyound a certain temperatue. However we know that the humble automobile engine handles much higher temperature. That is because it is not a turbine. Therefore in future it may become imperitive to explore rotary steam engines for the highest pressure and temperature stage of a steam power plant. These would be of the Wenkel type but with different valve opening and closing system. Lower pressure stages of the power plant can still be turbine based. And as mentioned in another post there is a possibility that power plants will return back to simpler configurations and smaller sizes. Bigger is not always better.

  UPDATE 2013: A new edition of the tables by the same author that are just as good and available at half the price are entitled "Steam Property Tables". They are also available at amazon here: http://www.amazon.com/Steam-Property-Tables-Thermodynamic-Properties/dp/147923026X These neatly printed tables are ideal for engineering students undergoing a course in Thermodynamics as well as for engineers in the power and steam industry.They are based on the latest standards.

While the entire world has switched over to SI units, it is sad the way the US power industry is still persisting with British Units. The funny thing is that even the British have switched over to SI units. They are so much more easier and convenient to use compared to the archaic British Units. The excuse that the power industry has been using is that it costs too much to switch over. That is just so much Bull. There are hardly any costs involved with the computer resources available today along with the use of decimal numbers . Afterall other countries have been able to afford it so why not the US ? No wonder the rest of the world would rather deal with Europe than USA when it comes to power issues. That is where the business and power jobs of the world are going. The US power industry appears to be just too lethargic and stuck in its ways to make the switch. Fortunately, the intellegentia, that is the scientific community in USA has switched over to SI units, but the industry contin...

I think modern power plants are just too big and too complicated. My view is that in the long run it is more economical to go in for smaller steam power plants as well as gas turbine plants in the range of 10MW to 50 MW. The plants need to be a lot simpler too. There simply is no need to have eight or nine feed water heaters. Just two should suffice. True there is a slight increase in thermal efficiency by increasing feed water heaters but the increased capital costs as well as downtime losses caused by the extra complications kill any possible advantage. I think the designers have been fooling the public with such complexities. The story is similar to other professionals. Lawyers and Doctors too often complicate simple cases. They say that human greed is at the root of this complication. If things are too simple how will the professional make a living? If a dentist just gives a simple filling that you could almost do yourself instead of a prolonged root canal how will he afford that b...