Integrated Gasification Combined Cycles

P M V Subbarao
Professor
Mechanical Engineering Department

Go Slow with Irreversible Process. The Combustion..

Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle

Integrated Gasification Combined Cycle (IGCC) is
emerging as a best available technology to utilize low
quality or contaminated energy resources, coal or oil.
It can meet emission limits not achievable by other
conventional or advanced competing technologies.
In particular IGCC offers refiners the possibility of
reducing to zero the production of residual fuel oil, an
increasingly undesired product, while at the same time,
co-producing electricity, hydrogen and steam.
It also drastically cuts SO2 emissions.

Basic Structure of IGCC

N2

Air

Critical Factors for Selection of IGCC

IGCC is a capital-intensive technology.
Therefore, to exploit with maximum profit all the advantages
of this technology, it is important to optimize the design to
improve performance and reduce capital cost.
One important design aspect is the degree of integration
between the gas turbine and the air separation unit.
The choice of the optimum degree of integration can bring
substantial benefits in performance efficiency and capital
outlay.
The selection of the best degree of integration to assure the
maximum profitability of IGCC.
The need of clean energy technologies has been in existence
since the first oil crisis more than 25 years ago.
IGCC is emerging today as one of the most promising
technologies to exploit low-quality solid and liquid fuels and
meet the most stringent emission limits.

How does IGCC work?

IGCC is a combination of two leading technologies.
The first technology is called coal gasification, which uses coal
to create a clean-burning gas (syngas).
The second technology is called combined-cycle, which is the
most efficient method of producing electricity commercially
available today.
Coal Gasification:
The gasification portion of the IGCC plant produces a clean coal
gas (syngas) which fuels the combustion turbine.
Coal is combined with oxygen in the gasifier to produce the
gaseous fuel, mainly hydrogen and carbon monoxide.
The gas is then cleaned by a gas cleanup process.
After cleaning, the coal gas is used in the combustion turbine to
produce electricity.

Coal Gasification

As early as 1800, coal gas was made by heating coal in the absence of
air.
Coal gas is rich in CH4 and gives off up to 20.5 kJ per liter of gas burned.
Coal gas or town gas, as it was also known became so popular that
most major cities and many small towns had a local gas house in which it
was generated, and gas burners were adjusted to burn a fuel that
produced 20.5 kJ/L.
A slightly less efficient fuel known as water gas can be made by reacting
the carbon in coal with steam.
C(s) + H2O(g) CO(g) + H2(g)
( Ho = 131.3 kJ/molrxn)
Water gas burns to give CO2 and H2O, releasing roughly 11.2 kJ per liter
of gas consumed.
Note that the enthalpy of reaction for the preparation of water gas is
positive, which means that this reaction is endothermic.
As a result, the preparation of water gas typically involves alternating
blasts of steam and either air or oxygen through a bed of white-hot coal .

The exothermic reactions between coal and oxygen to produce CO

and CO2 provide enough energy to drive the reaction between
steam and coal.
Water gas formed by the reaction of coal with oxygen and steam is
a mixture of CO, CO2, and H2. The ratio of H2 to CO can be
increased by adding water to this mixture, to take advantage of a
reaction known as the water-gas shift reaction.
CO(g) + H2O(g) CO2(g) + H2(g) Ho = -41.2 kJ/molrxn
The concentration of CO2 can be decreased by reacting the CO2
with coal at high temperatures to form CO.
C(s) + CO2(g) 2 CO(g) Ho = 172.5 kJ/molrxn
Water gas from which the CO2 has been removed is called
synthesis gas.
Synthesis gas can also be used to produce methane, or synthetic
natural gas (SNG).
CO(g) + 3 H2(g) CH4(g) + H2O(g)
2 CO(g) + 2 H2(g) CH4(g) + CO2(g)

Optimal Coal Gasifiers

The coal is fed into a high-temperature pressurized container
(Gasifier) along with steam and a limited amount of oxygen to
produce a gas.
Gasifiers convert carbonaceous feedstock into gaseous products at
high temperature and elevated pressure in the presence of oxygen and
steam.
Partial oxidation of the feedstock provides the heat.
At operating conditions, chemical reactions occur that produce
synthesis gas or "syngas," a mixture of predominantly CO and H2.
The gas is cooled and undesirable components, such as carbon
dioxide and sulphur are removed.

Classification of Gasifiers
Gasification systems can incorporate any one of a
number of gasifiers. Six gasification technologies that
are predominantly used in commercial applications
and/or have been extensively studied are:
Entrained Flow (Downflow) Gasifier
E-GAS Entrained Flow (Upflow) Gasifier
Shell Entrained Flow (Upflow) Gasifier
Fluidized-Bed Gasifier
Transport Reactor Gasifier
Lurgi Dry Ash Gasifier
British Gas/Lurgi Fixed-Bed Gasifier
Future Energy Entrained Flow Gasifier
Prenflo Entrained Bed Gasifier

Performance of A Gasifier
For comparing the predicted gasifier performance we focus on
characteristics of the syngas generated, in addition to the basic
flow field features.
The principle items of interest are the carbon conversion (i.e.,
% of carbon from the solid fuel converted to carbon in the
syngas) and
the syngas temperature, composition, higher heating value (HHV,
BTU and BTU/SCF) and
Cold gas efficiency (CGE) which is defined as:

m syngas HHVsyngas
CGE
m coal HHVcoal

GAS CLEANUP
After the fuel gas has left the heat exchanger, approximately 85% of
the particulates are removed in a cyclone.
A smaller percentage of the metals are also removed with the
particulate.
The recovered particulate and metals are then injected into the
molten glass.
The components of the glass are locked into the glass matrix and
cannot leach out.
The vitrified glass material passes EPA leachability tests.
The gas then goes through a scrubber where the hydrochloric acid
(HCL) is scrubbed out to form dilute HCL water.
The liquid goes through a series of nano filter membranes where the
particulates and metal in the liquid are removed.
The metals and particulate at this stage cannot go back into the
glass and can either be sold to a metal refiner or removed to a
landfill.
This small amount of material is the only potential material that goes
back to a landfill and represents less than a fraction of 1 percent of
the waste feedstock.

Integration Between Air Separation and Gas Turbine

An important area of IGCC technology improvement is the optimization of

the design and integration among the various components of the complex.
Integration means recovery of the waste energy available, improvement of
the efficiency and, where possible, reduction of the investment cost.
There are potential benefits of integrating two major components of the
IGCC: the gas turbine and the air separation plant.
There are several possible degrees of integration between the air separation
plant and the gas turbine.
In the case of total integration, 100% of the air required by the air
separation is supplied by bleeding some of the air from the discharge of the
gas turbine compressor.
Depending on the gas turbine frame this air is available at 10-15 bar,
therefore the air separation plant is a high-pressure type, delivering oxygen
and nitrogen at 3-4 bar.
Oxygen is recompressed and used in gasification, while nitrogen is
recompressed and reinjected in the syngas to replenish the mass deficit
caused by the air bleeding, and, at the same time, reduce N0x formation
during combustion by lowering the flame peak temperature.

Case Study
Foster Wheeler studied the impact of different degrees of
integration on the performance of an IGCC with the
following characteristics:
2 gas turbines GE 9001 FA
Capacity of GE 9001 FA: 286MW
co-production of H2 21500 Nm3/h
feed to gasification: visbroken tar 184.3 t/h
air separation plant: air feed 929.2 t/h
O2 206.5 t/h
N2 697.0 t/h

The Optimization of IGCC

Technology Selection
Process Simplification
Classes of Plant Quality
Process Reliability Modeling
Design-to-Capacity
Predictive Maintenance
Traditional Value Engineering
Constructability and Schedule Optimization

Plant Design and Operating Conditions

Plant Design and Operating Conditions

IGCC for Municipal Solid Waste

IGCC for Municipal Solid Waste

PROCESS FLOW DESCRIPTION

A process for transforming Municipal Solid
Waste (MSW) and other waste materials into
energy and useable by-products.
The process can be broken down into four subsystems: material handling, thermal
transformation or plasma gasification, gas
clean up, and steam and energy production.