Technical objectives
Increasing coal and lignite power plants’ flexibility
To define and simulate future coal and lignite power plant's work-flows and scenarios
To define and simulate future coal and lignite power plants’ work-flows and scenarios for advanced and complex flexible demand operations with massive renewable integration in the network
To enable entire load range optimization
To enable entire load range optimization with fast load changes, fast start-ups and shut-do
To develop advanced equipment solutions
To develop advanced equipment solutions contributing to increase modularity and reduce maintenance’s costs through the reduction of the turbomachinery size and to validate the solution at component level and at global level by simulating different scenarios/critical and nominal use cases
New boiler models with advanced thermo-hydraulics and mechanical
To analyse and define new boiler models with advanced thermo-hydraulics and mechanical characteristics to obtain sCO2 boiler solution, including detailed development
New turbomachinery system
To design and validate a new turbomachinery system through:
- analysis and definition of shaft lines requirements;
- compressor requirements and design near critical point operation;
- turbine modelling for sCO2 expansion.
New concept of compact heat exchanger
To design and test a new concept of compact heat exchanger for the cycle able to work with high efficiency, speed and reliability under high CO2 pressure and low pinch temperature
To define and test state of the art materials
To define and test state of the art materials used for power generation and high temperature applications,
- stainless steels (martensitic steel, austenitic/super-austenitic alloys) suitable to sCO2 environment
To develop Instrumentation & Control (I&C) solutions
To develop Instrumentation & Control (I&C) solutions for fast load change transients using advanced, model-based control design, supported by dynamic system-level modelling and simulation