Theoretically Estimating the Performance of Gas Turbines Under Varying Atmospheric Conditions

1976 ◽  
Vol 98 (1) ◽  
pp. 69-78 ◽  
Author(s):  
I. Ushiyama

It is well known that the performance of internal combustion engines is affected by varying atmospheric conditions, namely by the atmospheric temperature, pressure, and humidity. However, except for variable-speed gas turbines, performance correction formulas have not been established for gas turbines as they have for reciprocating engines. Although performance correction formulas, based on dimensional analysis, have been proposed for variable-speed gas turbines, these formulas are not applicable to the constant-speed gas turbines which are commonly used to drive generators. The correction quantities of gas turbines must be obtained experimentally. But, in general, a gas turbine, compared to a reciprocating engines, consumes such a large amount of air that conducting experiments at various atmospheric conditions in an environmental laboratory is hardly feasible. Therefore it is necessary to establish highly accurate performance correction formulas theoretically. The purpose of this paper, as a basic study in the development of correction formulas, is to analyze theoretically the effects of atmospheric conditions on the performance of gas turbines. For the purpose of analysis, the following concepts are introduced: (1) the use of moist air in place of dry air as the working medium, thus enabling one to estimate the effects of humidity; (2) the idea of “the specific output per unit volume” in addition to the specific output per unit mass and the thermal efficiency; (3) the effect of air temperature on the pressure ratio and the efficiency of the compressor. In the performance analysis, the following two methods are adopted: first, the changes in the efficiencies of the components are neglected while varying atmospheric conditions; second, as a more precise method, the changes in the efficiencies of the components are also considered. Finally, in order to confirm the validity of the assumptions and the calculation methods, the theoretical values obtained are compared with actual gas turbine data. As the result of this paper, the effects of varying atmospheric conditions on the performance of gas turbines are described quantitatively, so that the resultant change in performance can be estimated without experiment.

2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 28
Author(s):  
Emmanuel O. Osigwe ◽  
Arnold Gad-Briggs ◽  
Theoklis Nikolaidis

When selecting a design for an unmanned aerial vehicle, the choice of the propulsion system is vital in terms of mission requirements, sustainability, usability, noise, controllability, reliability and technology readiness level (TRL). This study analyses the various propulsion systems used in unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), paying particular focus on the closed-cycle propulsion systems. The study also investigates the feasibility of using helium closed-cycle gas turbines for UAV propulsion, highlighting the merits and demerits of helium closed-cycle gas turbines. Some of the advantages mentioned include high payload, low noise and high altitude mission ability; while the major drawbacks include a heat sink, nuclear hazard radiation and the shield weight. A preliminary assessment of the cycle showed that a pressure ratio of 4, turbine entry temperature (TET) of 800 °C and mass flow of 50 kg/s could be used to achieve a lightweight helium closed-cycle gas turbine design for UAV mission considering component design constraints.


Author(s):  
Dominik Ebi ◽  
Peter Jansohn

Abstract Operating stationary gas turbines on hydrogen-rich fuels offers a pathway to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the power generation sector. A key challenge in the design of lean-premixed burners, which are flexible in terms of the amount of hydrogen in the fuel across a wide range and still adhere to the required emissions levels, is to prevent flame flashback. However, systematic investigations on flashback at gas turbine relevant conditions to support combustor development are sparse. The current work addresses the need for an improved understanding with an experimental study on boundary layer flashback in a generic swirl burner up to 7.5 bar and 300° C preheat temperature. Methane-hydrogen-air flames with 50 to 85% hydrogen by volume were investigated. High-speed imaging was applied to reveal the flame propagation pathway during flashback events. Flashback limits are reported in terms of the equivalence ratio for a given pressure, preheat temperature, bulk flow velocity and hydrogen content. The wall temperature of the center body along which the flame propagated during flashback events has been controlled by an oil heating/cooling system. This way, the effect any of the control parameters, e.g. pressure, had on the flashback limit was de-coupled from the otherwise inherently associated change in heat load on the wall and thus change in wall temperature. The results show that the preheat temperature has a weaker effect on the flashback propensity than expected. Increasing the pressure from atmospheric conditions to 2.5 bar strongly increases the flashback risk, but hardly affects the flashback limit beyond 2.5 bar.


Author(s):  
Matti Malkamäki ◽  
Ahti Jaatinen-Värri ◽  
Antti Uusitalo ◽  
Aki Grönman ◽  
Juha Honkatukia ◽  
...  

Decentralized electricity and heat production is a rising trend in small-scale industry. There is a tendency towards more distributed power generation. The decentralized power generation is also pushed forward by the policymakers. Reciprocating engines and gas turbines have an essential role in the global decentralized energy markets and improvements in their electrical efficiency have a substantial impact from the environmental and economic viewpoints. This paper introduces an intercooled and recuperated three stage, three-shaft gas turbine concept in 850 kW electric output range. The gas turbine is optimized for a realistic combination of the turbomachinery efficiencies, the turbine inlet temperature, the compressor specific speeds, the recuperation rate and the pressure ratio. The new gas turbine design is a natural development of the earlier two-spool gas turbine construction and it competes with the efficiencies achieved both with similar size reciprocating engines and large industrial gas turbines used in heat and power generation all over the world and manufactured in large production series. This paper presents a small-scale gas turbine process, which has a simulated electrical efficiency of 48% as well as thermal efficiency of 51% and can compete with reciprocating engines in terms of electrical efficiency at nominal and partial load conditions.


Author(s):  
M. F. Bardon ◽  
J. A. C. Fortin

This paper examines the possibility of injecting methanol into the compressor of a gas turbine, then dissociating it to carbon monoxide and hydrogen so as to cool the air and reduce the work of compression, while simultaneously increasing the fuel’s heating value. A theoretical analysis shows that there is a net reduction in compressor work resulting from this dissociative intercooling effect. Furthermore, by means of a computer cycle model, the effects of dissociation on efficiency and work per unit mass of airflow are predicted for both regenerated and unregenerated gas turbines. The effect on optimum pressure ratio is examined and practical difficulties likely to be encountered with such a system are discussed.


Author(s):  
T. L. Ragland

After industrial gas turbines have been in production for some amount of time, there is often an opportunity to improve or “uprate” the engine’s output power or cycle efficiency or both. In most cases, the manufacturer would like to provide these uprates without compromising the proven reliability and durability of the product. Further, the manufacturer would like the development of this “Uprate” to be low cost, low risk and result in an improvement in “customer value” over that of the original design. This paper describes several options available for enhancing the performance of an existing industrial gas turbine engine and discusses the implications for each option. Advantages and disadvantages of each option are given along with considerations that should be taken into account in selecting one option over another. Specific options discussed include dimensional scaling, improving component efficiencies, increasing massflow, compressor zero staging, increasing firing temperature (thermal uprate), adding a recuperator, increasing cycle pressure ratio, and converting to a single shaft design. The implications on output power, cycle efficiency, off-design performance engine life or time between overhaul (TBO), engine cost, development time and cost, auxiliary requirements and product support issues are discussed. Several examples are provided where these options have been successfully implemented in industrial gas turbine engines.


Author(s):  
Uyioghosa Igie ◽  
Marco Abbondanza ◽  
Artur Szymański ◽  
Theoklis Nikolaidis

Industrial gas turbines are now required to operate more flexibly as a result of incentives and priorities given to renewable forms of energy. This study considers the extraction of compressed air from the gas turbine; it is implemented to store heat energy at periods of a surplus power supply and the reinjection at peak demand. Using an in-house engine performance simulation code, extractions and injections are investigated for a range of flows and for varied rear stage bleeding locations. Inter-stage bleeding is seen to unload the stage of extraction towards choke, while loading the subsequent stages, pushing them towards stall. Extracting after the last stage is shown to be appropriate for a wider range of flows: up to 15% of the compressor inlet flow. Injecting in this location at high flows pushes the closest stage towards stall. The same effect is observed in all the stages but to a lesser magnitude. Up to 17.5% injection seems allowable before compressor stalls; however, a more conservative estimate is expected with higher fidelity models. The study also shows an increase in performance with a rise in flow injection. Varying the design stage pressure ratio distribution brought about an improvement in the stall margin utilized, only for high extraction.


Author(s):  
Satoshi Hada ◽  
Masanori Yuri ◽  
Junichiro Masada ◽  
Eisaku Ito ◽  
Keizo Tsukagoshi

MHI recently developed a 1600°C class J-type gas turbine, utilizing some of the technologies developed in the National Project to promote the development of component technology for the next generation 1700°C class gas turbine. This new frame is expected to achieve higher combined cycle efficiency and will contribute to reduce CO2 emissions. The target combined cycle efficiency of the J type gas turbine will be above 61.5% (gross, ISO standard condition, LHV) and the 1on1 combined cycle output will reach 460MW for 60Hz engine and 670MW for 50Hz engine. This new engine incorporates: 1) A high pressure ratio compressor based on the advanced M501H compressor, which was verified during the M501H development in 1999 and 2001. 2) Steam cooled combustor, which has accumulated extensive experience in the MHI G engine (> 1,356,000 actual operating hours). 3) State-of-art turbine designs developed through the 1700°C gas turbine component technology development program in Japanese National Project for high temperature components. This paper discusses the technical features and the updated status of the J-type gas turbine, especially the operating condition of the J-type gas turbine in the MHI demonstration plant, T-Point. The trial operation of the first M501J gas turbine was started at T-point in February 2011 on schedule, and major milestones of the trial operation have been met. After the trial operation, the first commercial operation has taken place as scheduled under a predominantly Daily-Start-and-Stop (DSS) mode. Afterward, MHI performed the major inspection in October 2011 in order to check the mechanical condition, and confirmed that the hot parts and other parts were in sound condition.


2020 ◽  
Vol 142 (6) ◽  
Author(s):  
Felix Klein ◽  
Stephan Staudacher

Abstract Fair comparison of future aircraft engine concepts requires the assumption of similar technological risk and a transparent book keeping of losses. A 1000 km and a 7000 km flight mission of a single-aisle airplane similar to the Aribus A321neo LR have been used to compare composite cycle engines, turbocompound engines and advanced gas turbines as potential options for an entry-into-service time frame of 2050+. A 2035 technology gas turbine serves as reference. The cycle optimization has been carried out with a peak pressure ratio of 250 and a maximum cycle temperature of 2200 K at cruise as boundary conditions. With the associated heat loss and the low efficiency of the gas exchange process limiting piston component efficiency, the cycle optimization filtered out composite cycle concepts. Taking mission fuel burn (MFB) as the most relevant criterion, the highest MFB reduction of 13.7% compared to the 2035 reference gas turbine is demonstrated for an air-cooled turbocompound concept with additional combustion chamber. An intercooled, hectopressure gas turbine with pressure gain combustion achieves 20.6% reduction in MFB relative to the 2035 reference gas turbine.


Author(s):  
H. C. Eatock ◽  
M. D. Stoten

United Aircraft Corporation studied the potential costs of various possible gas turbine engines which might be used to reduce automobile exhaust emissions. As part of that study, United Aircraft of Canada undertook the preliminary design and performance analysis of high-pressure-ratio nonregenerated (simple cycle) gas turbine engines. For the first time, high levels of single-stage component efficiency are available extending from a pressure ratio less than 4 up to 10 or 12 to 1. As a result, the study showed that the simple-cycle engine may provide satisfactory running costs with significantly lower manufacturing costs and NOx emissions than a regenerated engine. In this paper some features of the preliminary design of both single-shaft and a free power turbine version of this engine are examined. The major component technology assumptions, in particular the high pressure ratio centrifugal compressor, employed for performance extrapolation are explained and compared with current technology. The potential low NOx emissions of the simple-cycle gas turbine compared to regenerative or recuperative gas turbines is discussed. Finally, some of the problems which might be encountered in using this totally different power plant for the conventional automobile are identified.


Author(s):  
M. S. N. Murthy ◽  
Subhash Kumar ◽  
Sheshadri Sreedhara

Abstract A gas turbine engine (GT) is very complex to design and manufacture considering the power density it offers. Development of a GT is also iterative, expensive and involves a long lead time. The components of a GT, viz compressor, combustor and turbine are strongly dependent on each other for the overall performance characteristics of the GT. The range of compressor operation is dependent on the functional and safe limits of surging and choking. The turbine operating speeds are required to be matched with that of compressor for wide range of operating conditions. Due to this constrain, design for optimum possible performance is often sacrificed. Further, once catered for a design point, gas turbines offer low part load efficiencies at conditions away from design point. As a more efficient option, a GT is practically achievable in a split configuration, where the compressor and turbine rotate on different shafts independently. The compressor is driven by a variable speed electric motor. The power developed in the combustor using the compressed air from the compressor and fuel, drives the turbine. The turbine provides mechanical shaft power through a gear box if required. A drive taken from the shaft rotates an electricity generator, which provides power for the compressor’s variable speed electric motor through a power bank. Despite introducing, two additional power conversions compared to a conventional GT, this split configuration named as ‘Part Electric Gas Turbine’, has a potential for new applications and to achieve overall better efficiencies from a GT considering the poor part load characteristics of a conventional GT.


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