MMEA (The Measurement, Monitoring and Environmental Efficiency Assessment) research program final seminar presentation by Researcher, Timo Korpela, Tampere University of Technology

1. Monitoring of Environmental
Efficiency in Power Plants
Timo Korpela* and Yrjö Majanne
Tampere University of Technology, Finland
Sirkka Koskela and Jáchym Judl
Finnish Environment Institute SYKE, Finland
MMEA Final Seminar, 26.11.2015, Helsinki
* timo.korpela@tut.fi
* +358 40 849 0063

2. FIRE in MMEA program
Measurement technology and analysers
Monitoring of power generation processes
Environmental Efficiency
1
2
3

3. Environmental impacts
 Direct emissions from energy conversion
processes
– Air, waterway and soil
– Climate change, acidification and particles
 Indirect emissions from fuels and wastes
– Fuel and chemical production and
transportation
– Waste transportation and handling

4.  Why is monitoring needed?
 Monitoring of direct emissions mainly conducted on-line
Monitoring in power plants
Authoritative regulations
• IE Directive (NOx, SO2, dust,…)
• EU Emission trading system (CO2,…)
Power plant operation
• Monitoring of optimal operation
• Prompt fault detection and identification
• Expressing sustainability for customers

5. Additional and redundant
measurement information by data
and first principle models
MMEA: Monitoring in power plants
with existing measurements
Soft sensors

6. Indirect NOx monitoring in
natural gas fired boilers
Soft
sensors:
Case: Patola boiler K2
• Linear model:
• 𝑁𝑂 𝑥,𝑒𝑠𝑡 = 10.9 ∙ 𝑂2 + 13.4 ∙ 𝑉𝑝𝑎 + 112
Which is valid when O2 < 3.0 % (d.b.)
• Modeldeveloped in 2/2015 and tested in 9/2015:
• Total RMSE-error is 4.5 mg/Nm3 and 3.2 %

7. Additional and redundant
measurement information by data
and first principle models
MMEA: Monitoring in power plants
with existing measurements
Detection of sensor failures and
process anomalies, and data
reconciliation
Soft sensors
Sensor quality
control

8. Detection of sensor failures
and process anomalies
Sensor
quality
control
50 100 150 200 250 300 350 400 450 500 550 600
0
5
10
15
Flue gas CO2
content
CO
2
(%,w.b.)
Time (h)
50 100 150 200 250 300 350 400 450 500 550 600
0
10
20
30
40
Flue gas H2
O content
H
2
O(%)
Time (h)
50 100 150 200 250 300 350 400 450 500 550 600
0
200
400
600
SO2
SO
2
(mg/Nm3,d.b.,O
2
=6%)
Time (h)

9. Additional and redundant
measurement information by data
and first principle models
MMEA: Monitoring in power plants
with existing measurements
Detection of sensor failures and
process anomalies, and data
reconciliation
Assistant to operators and
maintenance personnel
Soft sensors
Sensor quality
control
Decision
support

10. to operatorsDecision
support

11. Salmisaari CHP plant
Assessing environmental impacts along
the value chain: A case study
 Life Cycle Assessment methodology
 Five impact categories analysed, climate change in
focus
 Co-firing scenarios: 7% and 40% pellets as fuel
Methods and case scenarios
0
200
400
600
800
1000
1200
1400
1600
Climatechange
ktCO2-eq.
By-products and waste
Wood pellets, transport
Wood pellets, production
Coal, production and transport
Other inputs than fuels
Emissions of power plant
40% wood pellets
Example of results:

12. Salmisaari CHP plant
Assessing environmental impacts along
the value chain: A case study
 Life Cycle Assessment methodology
 Five impact categories analysed, climate change in
focus
 Co-firing scenarios: 7% and 40% pellets as fuel
Methods and case scenarios
 Significant reduction of climate impacts and the use
of fossil fuels can be achieved.
 Pellets are produced from dry saw dust and not
from roundwood.
 Renewable energy is used for drying.
Lessons learned
ESPECIALLY IF

13. Impact categories proposed for online reporting
Future outlook
Indirect
emissions
Direct
emissions
8 56
… …
… …
Indirect Direct
Climate change
Acidification
Fine particles
Example of a real time reporting combining online monitored direct
emissions with indirect impacts calculated with the use of LCA.
Contribution of emissions to impacts
defined by characterization factors.
LCA
Online
monitoring
Characterisation
t CO2-eq./h
t SO2-eq./h
t PM10-eq./h

14. Lessons learned
 The topic combined effectively different research topics and
value chain of MMEA.
 Measurement quality control is a necessity in power plants
 Direct and indirect emissions must be considered in
environmental efficiency to avoid problem shifting – setting the
system boundaries is a challenge
 Real time monitoring of environmental efficiency in power
plants provides valuable prospects

15. Acknowledgements