Green Energy News | December 16, 1997

December 16, 1996 – Vol.1 No.38

ENERGIES... week of December 16, 1996

CLEAN COAL TECHNOLOGY. The 107 megawatt state-of-the-art Pinon Pine Power Project went on line this month as part of a commercial demonstration project of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Clean Coal Technology Program. Partially funded by the DOE, Pinon Pine, built outside of Reno, Nevada, is operated by the Sierra Pacific Power Company to provide additional electricity for the growing economy in the area.

At the heart of Pinon Pine is a General Electric combustion turbine, not unlike one that would power a jet aircraft. Increased efficiency and environmentally friendly operation come from its combined cycle operation. The turbine generator can run on clean natural gas or gasified coal which will be produced at an adjoining coal gasifier facility at Pinon Pine. The less expensive of the two fuels will be used at any given time, with the savings passed on to consumers.

To further increase efficiency, hot exhaust gases from the turbine will be used to make high-pressure steam which will spin a condensing steam turbine generator to make additional electricity.

Foster Wheeler USA Corp. and the M.M. Kellogg Company provided engineering and technology for the project.

DYNAMIC VOLTAGE RESTORER In the same way a momentary power loss can raise havoc with a desktop computer; a brief power loss at a modern computer-controlled manufacturing facility can shut down production for hours at a heavy cost to the producer. Duke Power, which serves North and South Carolina, along with Westinghouse and the Electric Power Research Institute, think they can cure the manufacturers headache with the DVR - Dynamic Voltage Restorer.

The world’s first DVR was installed at the Orian Rug plant in Anderson, South Carolina where the occasional power interruption would cause high-tech computer controlled rug weaving equipment to shut down - making a mess in spilled yarn. Production losses would continue to occur in the hours needed to restart the equipment.

The DVR was devised to inject electricity into the line to prevent this kind of disaster after a lightning strike or when a tree falls on a wire. Presumably, the power injection by the DVR will give the manufacturing facility enough time to commence a controlled shut down of equipment or to start auxiliary generators for prolonged power outages.