Cycle Upgrade For Waste-To-Energy Power Plants

This paper assesses the potential of improving the performance of a waste to energy (WTE) power plant by upgrading the key parameters of the steam cycle. A parametric analysis as been carried out taking into account pressure and temperature of the superheated steam, steam turbine design parameters, flue gases out of integrated boiler conditions, combustion air temperature and steam cycle configuration in terms of regeneration. This paper considers two different WTE power plant configurations, a “base case” as the starting point for the analysis and an “advanced case” as a consequence of analysis results. Obtained results highlight the influence of the layout configuration passing from the base to advanced layout and the key parameters upgrade in terms of gained electric efficiency. An initial assessment about the relevance of the main steam cycle parameters must be outlined as a preliminary study in order to fully understand the possibilities and the benefits of a thermodynamic cycle upgrade for a WTE power plant. This parametric analysis can be useful as a preliminary tool to evaluate and compare different configurations and possible strategies to improve the efficiency of a WTE plant.