Applied Thermal Engineering 107 (2016) 1145–1157

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Applied Thermal Engineering

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/apthermeng

Research Paper

An integrated lignite pre-drying system using steam bleeds and exhaust

flue gas in a 600 MW power plant
Gang Xu, Wei Dong, Cheng Xu ⇑, Qi Liu, Yongping Yang ⇑
National Thermal Power Engineering and Technology Research Center, North China Electric Power University, Beijing 102206, China

h i g h l i g h t s

An improved pre-drying system using steam bleeds and exhaust flue gas is proposed.

Thermodynamic and economic analyses are quantitatively conducted.

Lower work loss and better matched energy level are obtained.

Higher energy efficiency and greater economic benefits are achieved.

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: An improved configuration of lignite pre-drying using both steam bleeds and boiler exhaust flue gas was
Received 1 May 2016 proposed in this study. Differing from the conventional lignite pre-drying power plant (LPDPP), a two-
Revised 11 July 2016 stage pre-drying system is adopted in this proposed LPDPP, where boiler exhaust and steam bleeds are
Accepted 12 July 2016
respectively the heat source of the two stage pre-drying. Thus, a part of waste heat of boiler exhaust
Available online 13 July 2016
can be recovered efficiently and the amount of steam required for drying could reduce by 30–40%, which
would significantly reduce the work loss of steam turbine brought by drying steam. Furthermore, through
Keywords:
employing the steam ejector, a part of steam at the 6th regenerative heater (RH6) can be entrained and
Lignite-fired power plant
Two-stage pre-drying system
the energy grade of drying steam could get lower, thus the work loss of steam turbine could be further
Steam ejector reduced. The results of a detailed thermodynamic analysis showed that, for a typical 600 MW lignite-fired
Thermodynamic analysis power plant (CLPP), the work loss of steam turbine brought by drying steam could be reduced from
Economic analysis 14.5 MW in the conventional LPDPP to 8.5 MW in the proposed design. The net power efficiency could
further increase by 0.4% with the heat rate reduction of 82.7 kJ/kW h as compared to the conventional
one. The additional net economic benefit of the proposed LPDPP could reach $4.63 M, which is $1.09 M
greater than that of the conventional one.
Ó 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Lignite is a low rank coal which is between peat and bituminous
coal as for the degree of coalification [1]. In China, the proven
reserve of lignite has exceeded 130 billion tons, accounting for
more than 13% of total national coal reserves [2]. Recent years,
more and more power plants begin burning lignite because of its
abundant reserves, easier mining and cheaper price. As low rank
coal, lignite generally features high moisture, ash and volatile
contents but low net heating value (LHV). Thus a conventional
lignite-fired power plant (CLPP) consumes more coals and
produces more flue gas as compared to bituminous-coal fired
⇑ Corresponding authors.
E-mail addresses: ncepu_xucheng@126.com (C. Xu),
(Y. Yang).
power plants with the same electric power outputs [3–5]. In addi-
tion, the thermal efficiency of a lignite fired boiler is also low due
to the low combustion efficiency and high exhaust flue gas temper-
ature [6]. Moreover, the electrical energy consumption of forced
draft fan, induced draft fan and other auxiliary equipment in a
CLPP will increase accordingly. Therefore, lignite pre-drying
technology is an optional approach to effectively improving the
plant thermal efficiency [7,8].
For the lignite pre-drying technology’s practicability and effec-
tiveness, it has recently attracted a great deal of attention amongst
the R&D and industry communities [9–12]. Extensive experimental
and numerical studies have been carried out on lignite drying
method and process, including conventional evaporative drying
and non-evaporative drying technology. Liu et al. [9] performed a
yypncepu@163.com
thermodynamic analysis of flue gas pre-drying and the steam
pre-drying methods, and calculated the main factors influencing

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.applthermaleng.2016.07.078
1359-4311/Ó 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
1146 G. Xu et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 107 (2016) 1145–1157

Nomenclature

Abbreviation N annual operation hours (h/yr)

APH air pre-heater O&M the ratio of annual operating and management cost to
CLPP conventional lignite-fired power plant ICC
COE cost of electricity p static pressure of the fluid (N/m2)
CP condensate pump q heat consumption rate of the power plant (kJ/kW h)
CRF capital recovery factor Qc total heat required for pre-drying (kW)
EG electric generator Qg heat released by the boiler exhaust flue gas dryer (kW)
ESP electrostatic precipitator Qs heat released by the steam (kW)
FGD flue gas desulfurization r average latent heat of the evaporation
FWP feed water pump S scale parameter
HHV high heating value t temperature (°C)
HPT high-pressure turbine V0 theoretical volume of air (m3/kg)
ICC installed capital costs Vx volume of the x composition in flue gas (m3/kg)
IPT intermediate-pressure turbine w annual capacity factor
LHV low net heating value W net net electric power output of the unit (kW)
LPDPP lignite pre-drying power plant a interest rate during construction
LPT low-pressure turbine ggd thermal utilization efficiency of the flue gas dryer
RH regenerative heater gsd thermal utilization efficiency of the steam dryer
ST secondary turbine gnet net power generation efficiency of the unit
k entrainment ratio of the steam ejector
Symbols u velocity coefficient of the mixing chamber
cc average specific heat capacity of the dried coal (kJ/kg °C) xp2 velocity of the working fluid at outlet of the mixing
ccd specific heat capacity of the coal at dry basis (kJ/kg °C) chamber (m/s)
cs average specific heat capacity of the steam (kJ/kg °C) xh2 velocity of the ejection fluid at inlet of the mixing
cw specific heat capacity of the water (kJ/kg °C) chamber (m/s)
ðcTÞx specific enthalpy of the x composition at temperature t x3 velocity of the mixed fluid at outlet of the mixing
(kJ/kg °C) chamber (m/s)
ce grid feed-in tariff of electric power ($/kW h)
ccoal coal price ($/MJ) Subscripts
Cp annual electricity sales income (M$) a air
Cc annual coal price (M$) c coal
Ct annual economic benefit (M$) e mixed fluid
f scale factor h ejection fluid
f p2 cross section area occupied by the working fluid at the g flue gas
inlet of the mixing chamber p working fluid
f h2 cross section area occupied by the ejection fluid at the s steam
inlet of the mixing chamber w water
I enthalpy (kJ/kg)
k annual discount rate Superscript
l expected plant lifetime (yr) in inlet of the dryer
M ar residual moisture content of the dried coal (%) out outlet of the dryer
m mass flow rate (kg/s)

the improvement of the plant’s thermal efficiency. Atsonios et al.
[10] investigated and optimized the existing lignite pre-drying
concepts so that the overall plant efficiency can be improved.
Jangam et al. [11] introduced a variety of familiar coal drying tech-
nologies and assessed their strengths and weaknesses on energy
utilization and environment. Rao et al. [12] presented recent devel-
opments in drying technology for low rank coals and discussed
their economic and environmental effect. The steam pre-drying
technology is a relatively mature method which is widely used in
industry, due to its high drying efficiency and security, relatively
small size in equipment [13–15]. However, large quantity of steam
bleeds are required to remove the moisture of lignite to expected
extent, which leads to a decrease in the practical work output of
steam turbine since this part of steam couldn’t develop work in
the following stages of turbine. Therefore, the performance of a
LPDPP using steam bleeds is largely depended on the quantity
and quality of the steam extracted for coal drying.
It should be noted that, there are some other alternative waste
heat resources in coal-fired power plant, such as exhaust flue gas
and hot circulating cooling water, which could also meet the
requirement of the lignite pre-drying [13,10]. Levy et al. [16] has
presented a concept of lignite pre-drying using the hot circulating
cooling water leaving the condenser to heat the air used for drying
the coal, which can fully take advantage of the waste heat of cool-
ing tower and further improve the efficiency of CLPP. Normally, the
temperature of hot circulating cooling water is relatively low and
the heat exchange area of the dryer should be designed with extre-
mely large size. Thus, the investment of the drying system will dra-
matically increase and the economic performance of the plant
cannot be assured. By contrast, the temperature of boiler exhaust
flue gas in a CLPP can reach 130–150 °C, which is more suitable
for the drying process. Xu et al. [17] proposed an improved concept
for the pre-drying of medium moisture bituminous coals using flue
gas waste heat, and evaluated its thermal and economic perfor-
mances. Boiler exhaust flue gas has been proved to be an appropri-
ate heat source for lignite pre-drying, which possesses great safe
reliability and economic benefits. However, the temperature of
exhaust flue gas is restricted by the dew point of SOx acid, which
could only be reduced to 90–100 °C so that fouling and corrosion
has not occurred yet [18–20]. Thus, the moisture content of lignite
 G. Xu et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 107 (2016) 1145–1157 1147

commonly couldn’t be dried to a relatively economical extent Table 2

Overall performance of the reference unit.
when using flue gas waste heat as the sole heat source, for the sen-
sible heat of exhaust flue gas is limited. Items Units Values
Against this backdrop, this paper proposed an integrated sys- Coal input rate kg s1 85.0
tem of lignite pre-drying using steam bleeds and exhaust flue gas Live steam mass flow rate kg s1 459.3
in a lignite fired power plant, to achieve the following objectives: Total energy of coal input (LHV basis) MWth 1,368.4
(1) to analyse the energy consumption of a conventional LPDPP Gross electrical output MWe 600.3
Total auxiliary power MWe 33.0
and present an improved system using steam bleeds and exhaust Net electrical output MWe 567.3
flue gas, which could further increase the net energy efficiency of Net efficiency % 41.5
a LPDPP through decreasing both the quantity and quality of steam
bleeds for drying; (2) to perform the comprehensive thermody-
namic analysis and calculate the energy efficiency improvement efficiency (on LHV basis) is 92.4% with the exhaust flue gas
in the proposed LPDPP; and (3) to assess economic performance temperature at 142.0 °C. The overall thermodynamic performance
of the proposed LPDPP as compared to the conventional one. and parameters of the regenerative system are listed in Tables 2
and 3, respectively.

2. Thermodynamic analysis of a conventional LPDPP

2.1. Reference power plant
The reference case analysed here is a 600 MW super critical
steam power plant, which is an existing plant in China firing lignite
directly. The live steam temperature and pressure are 24.2 MPa
and 566.0 °C respectively. The live steam generated in the boiler
expands in the high-pressure turbine (HPT), and then is reheated
in the boiler at 3.23 MPa and 566.0 °C. The reheated steam then
successively expanded through the intermediate-pressure turbines
(IPT) and the low-pressure turbines (LPT). A classical regenerative
system with eight-stage regenerative heaters (RHs) is employed to
heat the feed/condensed water. The schematic of the thermal cycle
of the reference power plant is shown in Fig. 1, and the chemical
constituents of fired lignite are shown in Table 1. In design
condition, the mass flow rate of raw coal is 85.0 kg/s and the boiler
2.2. Conventional LPDPP
The schematic of a conventional LPDPP using steam bleeds as
the heat source of drying is shown in Fig. 2. In the conventional
LPDPP, a pre-drying system is employed, where a steam rotary-
tube dryer is equipped to dry the raw lignite. According to the
requirements of drying process and the parameters of the
reference steam cycle, the appropriate steam the dryer required
is provided by the bleeding from RH5, which is extracted from
LPT. As shown in Table 3, the parameters of steam bleeds from
RH5 are 0.43 MPa/282.3 °C and the steam leaving the dryer con-
densed into saturated water after releasing heat. Meanwhile, the
moisture content of the dried lignite fed into the boiler is reduced
from 32.2% to 12.0% (wet basis). The details of the components of
dried lignite are shown in the second row of Table 1. The net heat-
ing value of dried lignite reaches 21.65 MJ/kg, which increases by

8
EG
1 2 HPT IPT LPT

7
ST 13
4 3 5 9 10 11 12
6
15

Deaerator
CP
RH1 RH2 RH3 FWP RH5 RH6 RH7 RH8
Boiler
14

APH

16 17
FAN
ESP FGD

FAN

Fig. 1. Schematic of the reference power plant.

Table 1
Composition of the raw and pre-dried lignite.

Items Mar (wt%) Aar (wt%) Car (wt%) Har (wt%) Oar (wt%) Nar (wt%) Sar (wt%) Qnet,ar (MJ/kg)
Raw lignite 32.2 6.60 44.63 2.95 12.33 0.70 0.55 16.10
Dried lignite 12.0 8.57 57.96 3.83 16.01 0.91 0.71 21.65
1148 G. Xu et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 107 (2016) 1145–1157

Table 3
Details of reference steam cycle performance.

Items Regenerative system parameters

RH1 RH2 RH3 DEA RH5 RH6 RH7 RH8
Extracted steam pressure (MPa) 6.01 3.78 2.15 1.06 0.43 0.12 0.060 0.022
Extracted steam temperature (°C) 349.9 290.8 500.8 397.9 282.3 185.0 95.2 62.4
Extracted steam flow rate (kg s1) 33.1 29.3 18.6 22.4 23.5 10.7 13.5 12.1
Inlet feed water temperature (°C) 245.3 214.5 185.8 141.6 101.5 81.8 58.5 35.5
Outlet feed water temperature (°C) 275.4 245.3 214.5 180.4 141.6 101.5 81.8 58.5

8
EG
1 2 HPT IPT LPT

7
ST 13
4 3 5 10 11 12
6
15
9 20
Deaerator
CP
RH1 RH2 RH3 FWP RH5 RH6 RH7 RH8
Boiler
14

21
APH Raw Lignite
18
Crusher
16 17 22
FAN
ESP FGD

FAN 21 19
Pre-drying system Pre-dried
Lignite

Fig. 2. Schematic of the conventional LPDPP.

35% compared with the raw coal, due to that the moisture content where mc and mw are the mass flow rate of the raw lignite and the
of dried lignite decreases and the other components increase. At water evaporated from the lignite (kg/s); t out
g and t out
c are the tem-
the same time, the temperature of the exhaust flue gas decreases perature of the dryer exhaust gas and the dried coal at outlet of
to 130.0 °C and the boiler efficiency (on LHV basis) of the LPDPP the dryer (°C); tin
c is the temperature of the raw coal at inlet of the
can reach 93.5%. dryer (°C); cs and cc are the average specific heat capacity of the
steam and the dried coal (kJ/kg °C); r represents the latent heat of
2.3. Thermodynamic model of the conventional LPDPP the moisture evaporation, which is about 2500 kJ/kg. This value is
widely adopted in the conversion of HHV and LHV [21], and the cal-
2.3.1. Heat balance of the steam dryer culation process of lignite pre-drying [17,22].
In the conventional LPDPP, the core equipment of the pre- The average specific heat capacity of the dried coal can be
drying system is dryer using the steam bleed, which is employed obtained:
to dry the raw lignite by steam bleeds. So the energy consumption  
of the steam dryer and the influence on the whole unit it brings Mar M ar
cc ¼ cw þ 1  ccd ð2Þ
should be analysed. 100 100
For the lignite drying process, the heat absorbed by the raw lig-
nite can be divided into two parts: the heat absorbed by evapo- where Mar is residual moisture content of the dried coal, cw and ccd
rated moisture from the coal (Q w is the specific heat capacity of the water and the coal at dry basis.
c ), and the heat absorbed by the
For rotary-tube dryer using steam bleed as heat resource, the
other part of the coal (Q cd
c ). Moreover, the heat absorbed by evap-
heat released by the steam is equal to the steam enthalpy drop
orated moisture from the coal can also be divided into two parts:
between the inlet and outlet of the dryer, which can be expressed
the heat required for moisture evaporation and the heat required
as:
for the temperature rise of the moisture. For the calculation of
 
Qw c , we assume that the moisture is evaporated at the temperature Q s ¼ ms  Iin out
s  Iw ð3Þ
tin in out
c , then the evaporated steam is further heated from t c to t g .
Thus, the total heat required for pre-drying can be calculated from where ms is the mass flow rate of the steam required for drying
[17]: (kg/s), Iin out
s and I w are the enthalpies of the steam at inlet and the
h i  out  condensate at outlet of the dryer (kJ/kg), which is determined by
Q c ¼ mw r þ cs ðt out
g  t c Þ þ c c ðmc  mw Þ t c  t c
in in
ð1Þ
the steam and water’s pressure and temperature.
 G. Xu et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 107 (2016) 1145–1157
Table 4
Details of model considerations of the main components.
Components Models
Boiler Dry ash extraction and single reheat is modelled as a black box
Steam turbines Isentropic efficiency HPT/IPT/LPT = 0.895/0.915/0.910. Exhaust pressure = 0.058 bar. Mechanical efficiency = 0.998
RHs Upper terminal temperature difference, and the lower terminal temperature difference of the after-cooler are to be specified. Pressure loss = 3.3–5% in
steam extraction of different RHs, heat loss = 0%
Condenser Inlet temperature (20 °C) and pressure (0.1 MPa) of cooling medium is specified, upper temperature difference = 5 °C, pressure loss = 0.005 MPa
Pumps Isentropic efficiency = 0.85, mechanical efficiency = 0.998, discharge pressure: condenser pump = 1.04 MPa, feed water pump = 30.82 MPa
Electric Generator efficiency = 0.991
generator
Considering the heat loss in the steam dryer during operation,
the thermal utilization efficiency of the steam dryer is represented
by gsd and the heat balance equation of steam dryer can be
expressed as:
  h i  out
ms  Iin out
s  Iw gsd ¼ mw r þ cs ðtout
g  t c Þ þ c c ðmc  mw Þ t c  t c
in in
2.3.2. System simulation and main assumptions
The energy balance of the steam dryer has been calculated in
Section 2.3.1. The thermal cycle and energy equilibrium of the ref-
erence unit and the LPDPP are simulated by EBSILON Professional
software, which is widely used for the design, evaluation and opti-
mization of different types of power plants [23,24]. The model
details of the main components used in the simulation are shown
in Table 4.
Some assumptions are made during the simulation and
calculation: (1) The sensible heat increase of dried lignite due to
the temperature rising is neglected; (2) The power consumption
rate of the LPDPP is unchanged before and after drying; (3) The
other heat losses of the boiler except heat loss is constant; and
(4) A constant flue gas temperature of 380 °C at the economizer
exit and an ambient temperature of 25 °C are assumed.
2.4. Energy consumption analysis
It is well known that drying is a highly energy-intensive unit,
and hence, the steam dryer normally requires a large amount of
steam for the lignite drying to a low moisture content. The calcu-
lation results of heat required for lignite drying in the conventional
LPDPP are shown in Table 5. In the pre-drying system the raw lig-
nite is heated by the steam extracted from RH5, and its tempera-
ture increases from 25.0 °C to 103.0 °C. Meanwhile, the moisture
content of lignite is reduced from 32.2% to 12.0%. Moreover, the
steam condensed into saturated water after releasing heat and its
temperature drops to 146.2 °C correspondingly. The thermal effi-
ciency of the steam rotary-tube dryer is considered to be 97.0%.
As a result, the total heat for the drying process is 61.2 MWth,
and the mass flow rate of the steam needed for drying is 25.3 kg/s.
It should be noted that, considering the influence of seasonality,
coal type and the unit load on lignite supply, the capacity of the
dryer normally need to be designed larger to face with different
operation conditions. Accordingly, the amount of steam extracted
for pre-drying may vary as the changes of the unit load and coal
type, which required a flexibility of the steam extraction rate. Gen-
erally, for the steam turbine the amount of steam extracted for pre-
drying can self-adjust. It means that when the lignite supply
increases, the mass flow rate of the steam extraction only
increased slightly and the steam extraction rate is almost constant.
This is due to that when the amount of raw lignite increases, the
heat released in the boiler furnace also increases at the same time
and then more feed water can be heated and evaporate in the boi-
ler. Thus, the steam extraction rate can keep constant.
1149
Table 5
Calculation results of heat required for drying.
Items Units Values
 Raw lignite input rate kg s1 85.0
Raw lignite input temperature °C 25.0
Dried lignite output rate kg s1 65.5
ð4Þ Dried lignite output temperature °C 103.0
Evaporation rate of the water in lignite kg s1 19.6
Temperature of the evaporated water °C 103.0
Temperature of the condensed water °C 146.2
Required heat for drying MW 59.3
Thermal efficiency of the dryer % 97.0
Total heat for the dryer MW 61.2
Required steam rate bleeding from RH5 kg s1 25.3
As a certain amount of steam at RH5 is extracted to the dryer,
the amount of steam passing through the LTP will reduce. This will
eventually lead to a reduction of the unit’s electric power output
and weaken the energy saving effect brought by lignite pre-
drying. Calculation results show that, due to 25.3 kg/s of steam at
RH5 is extracted for drying, the electric power output of the refer-
ence unit will decrease by 14.5 MW, which is approximately 7.8%
of the total power outputs of LTP. The amount of steam required
for lignite drying has a great influence on the performance of the
conventional LPDPP. On the one hand, the steam extracted for dry-
ing could not develop work in the following stages of turbine,
which leads to a reduction of the unit’s electric power output. On
the other hand, the flow condition of steam and the pressure of
steam bleeds in the following stages of turbine would also be
affected by the drying steam bleeds. As a result, the effectiveness
of steam turbine will decrease. Therefore, reducing the amount of
steam required for coal drying could effectively improve the effi-
ciency of a conventional LPDPP.
Obviously, the work loss of the steam turbine is also related to
the parameters of the steam used for coal pre-drying. The work
loss of the steam turbine when using steam bleeds with different
parameters was compared in Fig. 3, in which steam extraction ratio
represents the drying extraction’s proportion accounted for the
main steam flow (%) and the drying degree represents the mass
of water removed from per unit mass of raw lignite (kg/kg). For
steam extracted from different stages, when the drying degree is
constant, the steam extraction ratios are almost the same, only
with a little rise when the parameters of steam decrease. For exam-
ple, when the steam extraction point changes from RH4 (1.06 MPa,
397.9 °C) to RH6 (0.12 MPa, 185.0 °C), the steam extraction ratio
only increased from 5.12% to 5.30%. (Fig. 3(a)). This is due to that
most of the required heat for pre-dying comes from the latent of
the steam extractions, which accounts for approximately 80–85%
of the total required heat, and the latent heat contained in steam
extracted from different RHs are almost equal.
However, the work capacity varies significantly, which declines
sharply with the reduction of steam parameters. It can also be seen
from Fig. 3(b) that, the work capacity of steam extracted from RH4
1150 G. Xu et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 107 (2016) 1145–1157

6 can reach 899.5 kJ/kg, which is almost twice that of the steam
extracted from RH6.
5 As a result, the power output of the turbine would decrease due
Steam extraction ratio (%)

to a part of steam is extracted for drying, and the higher the

4 steam’s parameters are, the larger the turbine’s work loss will be
(Fig. 3(c)). Therefore, to further match the steam source and the
rotary-tube dryer, and reduce the amount and parameters of steam
3
extracted for drying can undoubtedly increase the efficiency of a
conventional LPDPP.
2

1 3. Proposal of an improved LPDPP using both flue gas and steam

bleeds
0
3.1. Conceptualization
4 5 6
Steam extraction No. The energy consumption analysis in Section 2.4 shows that the
(a) Steam extraction ratio of different stage performance of a conventional LPDPP using steam bleeds is largely
related to the amount of steam extracted from the turbine. The
extraction for drying
more steam extracted for drying is, the more work loss of the
1000 turbine will be. Therefore, it is beneficial to use some waste heat
Work capacity of steam extracion (kJ/kg)

to replace a part of steam bleeds for the pre-drying system.

Commonly, in a CLPP the temperature of boiler exhaust flue gas
800 can reach 130–150 °C and enormous heat is directly released into
the environment. It can be further reduced to 90–100 °C with con-
sideration of acid dew point limitation. The heat released by the
600
flue gas cooling could be used as the heat source of drying, which
could remove 4–8% moisture from lignite. Thus, the waste heat
400 from the flue gas could be served as an alternative supplement
energy source for coal pre-frying. Therefore, a two-stage lignite
pre-drying system using both exhaust flue gas and steam bleeds
200 is proposed in this study.
Fig. 4 illustrates the thermal process of the two-stage pre-
drying system. In the first stage pre-drying the boiler exhaust flue
0
gas releases heat in the dryer, and a part of water in the raw lignite
4 5 6
is removed out by the flue gas. During this process the temperature
Steam extraction No. of flue gas reduces from 130–150 °C to 90–100 °C, and the mois-
ture content of lignite reduces by 4–8%. In the second stage pre-
(b) Work capacity of different stage steam
drying the pre-dried lignite is further heated by the steam bleeds
extraction extracted from the turbine, which is normally ranging from 0.15
to 0.5 MPa, and finally the moisture content of the dried lignite
Work loss of steam extracion for drying (MW)

would reduce to 12.0%. Obviously, the amount of steam extracted

20
for coal pre-drying would greatly decrease by using part of the flue
gas waste heat.

15
3.2. Application of the steam ejector

In order to reduce the work loss of steam turbine brought by

10 drying steam and further increase the efficiency of a LPDPP, it is
expected that more low-grade steam can be used as the heat
source of the lignite pre-drying. In the conventional LPDPP, the
5 heat source of lignite drying is steam extracted from RH5, which
is at 0.43 MPa/282.3 °C and the corresponding saturated tempera-
ture can reach 146.2 °C. In fact, considering the temperature of the
drying heat source and the required temperature difference in the
0
practical coal pre-drying process, and to avoid lignite spontaneous
4 5 6
combustion, the appropriate saturated temperature of drying
Steam extraction No. steam should range from 110 to 120 °C (the corresponding steam
(c) Work lossof different stage pressure is 0.14–0.20 MPa). Therefore, in this study the pressure
of drying steam could be designed to 0.16 MPa in this study, whose
extractionfor drying
saturated temperature is 113 °C. In the reference unit, the pressure
Fig. 3. Energy consumption analysis of the dryer when using steam bleeds with of the steam extracted from RH6 is 0.12 MPa, which is close to the
different parameters. optimal pressure but a slightly low for the steam dryer. Naturally,
 G. Xu et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 107 (2016) 1145–1157 1151

Boiler Exhaust Steam Bleeds

Dryer 130 - 150°C 0.15-0.5 MPa

Raw Dried
Lignite Lignite
Flue Gas Condensed Water
95 - 105°C 110 -150 ć

ĉ-stage Pre-drying Ċ-stage Pre-drying

Use waste heat from Use steam bleeds from
boiler to dry the lignite turbine to dry the lignite

Energy Flow Lignite Flow Water Flow

Fig. 4. Thermal process of two stage pre-drying system.

Recipient Chamber
Mixing Chamber To be specific, the raw coal is firstly crushed by the coal crusher
and then is fed into the rotary dryer to be heated by the boiler
Working Steam Mixed Steam exhaust flue gas, in which the temperature of the coal is raised
˄0.43 MPa, 282.3ć˅ ˄0.16 MPa, 231.5ć˅ to 62 °C and the moisture content is reduced from 32.2 to 27.1%.
Nozzle
Simultaneously, the boiler flue gas releases heat in the dryer and
its temperature drops from 130 °C to 95 °C. The dryer exhaust,
Ejection Steam
˄0.12 MPa, 185.0ć˅ i.e., the waste moisture evaporated from the raw lignite mixed
with flue gas, is fed into the baghouse to be cleaned. Then the
Fig. 5. Structural diagram of the steam ejector. pre-dried coal is delivered to the second pre-drying unit (sub-
system), where the core devices are the steam rotary-tube dryer
the steam ejector is considered to be employed and a part of steam
and the steam ejector. In the ejector, the steam at RH6 is entrained
bleeds at RH6 can be entrained by the steam at RH5.
by the steam at RH5. Then the mixed steam (0.16 MPa/231.5 °C) is
Steam ejector is a device which can use high-pressure steam to
piped to the rotary-tube dryer to further dry the pre-dried coal.
improve the parameters of the low-pressure steam without con-
After releasing heat in the dryer, the steam condenses into water
suming mechanical energy. It is widely used in various industrial
(113.3 °C) in the tube, and returns back to the RH6. Meanwhile,
fields. The structural diagram of the steam ejector is shown in
the coal is heated to 103.0 °C and the moisture content is removed
Fig. 5. The high-pressure working fluid passes through the Laval
to 12.0% eventually. Finally, the lignite being completely dried is
nozzle and flows out at supersonic speed but with negative pres-
transported into pulverizing system and then the pulverized coal
sure. Thus, the low-parameter ejection fluid can be induced to
is fed to the boiler for combustion.
mix with the high-pressure working fluid to form a mixed fluid
Obviously, in the proposed LPDPP, the amount of steam
with intermediate pressure [25]. For example, in the reference
required for pre-drying will decrease, due to a part of waste heat
case, some steam at RH6 (0.12 MPa/185.0 °C) can be entrained by
of the boiler exhaust flue gas is partly used to dry the lignite. More-
the steam at RH5 (0.43 MPa/282.3 °C) and the pressure of the
over, parameters of the steam for drying will get lower compared
mixed steam is designed to be 0.16 MPa. Calculation results show
with the conventional one, mainly due to the application of the
that the temperature of the mixed steam would be 231.5 °C and
steam ejector, which could use high-pressure steam to eject some
the entrainment ratio of the ejector is 1.04, which means
low-pressure steam. Therefore, the work loss of the turbine will
1.04 kg/s of steam at RH6 can be entrained by 1.0 kg/s of steam
decrease and the efficiency of the unit will further increase for
at RH5. Then the mixed steam (0.16 MPa/231.5 °C) can be used
the proposed LPDPP.
as the heat source of coal drying.

3.3. Configuration of an improved LPDPP using both boiler exhaust and 4. Methodology
steam bleeds
4.1. Thermodynamic models of the additional equipment
Based on the analysis above, an improved LPDPP using both boi-
ler exhaust and steam bleeds is proposed. Fig. 6 shows the sche- 4.1.1. Flue gas dryer
matic of the proposed LPDPP. Compared with the conventional The heat balance of the steam dryer has been given in Sec-
one, the major characteristics of the proposed system are: the tion 2.3.1 and the heat absorbed by the raw lignite during pre-
two stage pre-drying system is adopted in the plant, where drying process can be calculated by Eq. (1). For rotary dryer using
exhaust flue gas and steam bleeds are the heat resource of the first the waste heat of boiler flue gas, the heat released in the dryer is
and second stage pre-drying, respectively; the steam ejector is equal to the flue gas enthalpy drop between the inlet and outlet
employed in the pre-drying system, which can eject a part of steam of the dryer, which can be expressed as:
 
at RH6 and reduce the amount of steam extracted from RH5 for
Q g ¼ mf  Iin out
g  Ig ð5Þ
drying.
1152 G. Xu et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 107 (2016) 1145–1157

8
EG
1 2 HPT IPT LPT

7
ST 13
4 3 5 11 12
6 9
15
20 10
Deaerator
CP
Boiler RH1 RH2 RH3 FWP RH5 RH6 RH7 RH8
14

21
APH Raw Coal

17 Crusher 25
16
18 SE
FAN Baghouse
23
ESP To FGD
22
19
Water Pre-dried
Condensate Lignite
21 24
I-stage Pre-drying II-stage Pre-drying

Fig. 6. The proposed LPDPP using both flue gas and steam bleeds.

where mf is the mass flow rate of the flue gas; Iin out
g and I g are the The law of energy conservation can be expressed as:
enthalpy of flue gas at the dryer’s inlet and outlet. Ip þ kIh ¼ ð1 þ kÞIe ð11Þ
The enthalpy of flue gas per kilogram can be calculated as
followed: where Ip , Ih and Ie are the enthalpies (kJ/kg) of the working fluid, the
ejection fluid and the mixed fluid, respectively; k is the entrainment
Ig ¼ I0g þ ða  1ÞI0a ð6Þ ratio of the steam ejector, which is defined as the amount of ejec-
tion fluid that can be entrained by a given amount of working fluid,
where I0g and I0a are the theoretical enthalpy of flue gas and air, e.g., k ¼ mh =mp :
respectively; a is the excess air ratio. The law of momentum conservation can be expressed as:
In the formula above, the theoretical enthalpies of flue gas and
air can be determined by the following equations: uðmp xp2 þ mh xh2 Þ  ðmp þ mh Þx3
¼ ðp3  p2 Þf p2 þ ðp3  ph2 Þf h2 ð12Þ
I0g ¼ V RO2 ðcTÞRO2 þ V N2 ðcTÞN2 þ V H2 O ðcTÞH2 O ð7Þ
where xp2 , xh2 and x3 are the velocity (m/s) of the working fluid,
I0a 0
¼ V ðcTÞa ð8Þ the ejection fluid at inlet of the mixing chamber and the mixed fluid
at outlet of the mixing chamber; pp2 , ph2 and p3 are the static pres-
where V 0 represents the theoretical volume of air (m3/kg); Vx is the sure (N/m2) of the working fluid, the ejection fluid at inlet of the
volume of the x composition in flue gas, and ðcTÞx is the specific mixing chamber and the mixed fluid at outlet of the mixing cham-
enthalpy (kJ/m3) of the x composition at temperature T. ber; f p2 , f h2 are the cross section areas (m2) occupied by the working
Besides, considering that there will be some heat loss in the fluid and the ejection fluid at the inlet of the mixing chamber,
rotary dryer during operation. Here we assume the thermal utiliza- respectively; u is the velocity coefficient of the mixing chamber.
tion efficiency of the dryer is ggd . When the parameters of the working fluid, the ejection fluid
By applying a thermal balance for the overall dryer, the follow- and the pressure of the mixed fluid are known, the entrainment
ing equation can be obtained: ratio and efficiency of the ejector can be determined with Eqs.
  h i (10)–(12) and relevant formulas in gas dynamics [26].
mc  Iin out
g  Ig ggd ¼ mw r þ cs ðtout
g  t c Þ þ c c ðmc  mw Þðt c  t c Þ
in out in

ð9Þ 4.2. Thermodynamic evaluation criteria

The thermal cycle and energy equilibrium of the proposed

4.1.2. Steam ejector
The steam ejector needs to comply with three laws during oper-
ation, namely law of mass conservation, energy conservation and
momentum conservation [25,26].
The law of mass conservation can be expressed as:
me ¼ mp þ mh
where mp , mh and me are the mass flow rate (kg/s) of the working
fluid, the ejection fluid and the mixed fluid, respectively.
LPDPP can also be simulated by EBSILON Professional software.
The main components models and assumptions are introduced in
Section 2.3.2.
In the electric power plant, a number of parameters are used to
evaluate the thermal performance of power generation units,
ð10Þ among which the net energy efficiency and heat consumption rate
are the most important two parameters. Heat consumption rate is
the heat input required to produce one unit of electricity (1 kW),
which can be defined by the following expression [17]:
 G. Xu et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 107 (2016) 1145–1157 1153

Heat consumption rateðkJ=kW hÞ C c ¼ 3:6mc  ccoal  LHV  N  w ð22Þ

Heat consumption ðkJ=hÞ where N denotes the operation hours per year and w is the average
¼ ð13Þ
Generator output ðkWÞ capacity factor; ce and ccoal represent the grid feed-in tariff of elec-
where the generator output of the power plant is the net electric tric power ($/kW h) and coal price ($/MJ) on a LHV basis,
power output: Wnet, kW. The heat consumption of the power plant respectively.
is the heat released by raw coal in the furnace, which can be calcu- Besides, the cost of electricity (COE) can also be used to evaluate
lated by the following formula: the economic performance of a power plant from another point of
view, which can be calculated according to the following equation
Heat consumptionðkJ=hÞ ¼ 3600mc  LHV ð14Þ [15]:
where mc denotes the mass flow rate of raw coal consumed (kg/s) C c þ ICC  ðCRF  ð1 þ aÞ þ O&MÞ
and LHV represents the low net heating value (kJ/kg); 3600 can COE ¼ ð23Þ
W Nw
be considered to be 3600 s/h.
Thus, the heat consumption rate can be calculated and further
deduced by the following formula [17,27]: 5. Results and discussion
 
3600mc  LHV Wnet
q¼ ¼ 3600 ¼ 3600=gnet ð15Þ 5.1. Thermodynamic analysis
Wnet mc  LHV
where Wnet denotes the net electric power output (kW) and gnet The parameters of the pressure, temperature, mass flow of main
represents the net power generation efficiency (LHV basis). streams in the conventional LPDPP (as shown in Fig. 2) and the pro-
posed LPDPP (as shown in Fig. 6) are listed in Table 6. The thermal
4.3. Economic evaluation criteria performance of the two LPDPPs are presented in Table 7.
The following observations are derived from Table 6 and 7: (1)
In a coal-fired power plant, the total installed capital costs (ICC) The temperature of boiler exhaust flue gas decreases from 142 °C
mainly include the purchased equipment costs, the installation and
engineering fees, and the process and project contingency. For a
reference 600 MW power plant in China, the ICC is estimated at Table 6
Main parameters of the main streams in the conventional and proposed LPDPPs.
$490 M [28]. In a LPDPP, some additional equipment, such as coal
crusher and rotary dryer are required, which will lead to an Stream Conventional LPDPP Proposed LPDPP
increase of the ICC. For the conventional LPDPP, the ICC increase ID
m P (bar) T (°C) m P (bar) T (°C)
can be expressed as: (kg/s) (kg/s)

DICCLDPP ¼ ICCsdryer þ ICCcrusher þ ICCbaghouse ð16Þ 1 415.5 32.3 566.0 415.5 32.3 566.0
2 480.8 242.0 566.0 480.8 242.0 566.0
For the proposed LPDPP, the ICC increase is: 3 34.7 60.1 349.9 34.7 60.1 349.9
4 30.6 37.8 290.8 30.6 37.8 290.8
DICCLDPP ¼ ICCcrusher þ ICCf dryer þ ICCsdryer þ ICCbaghouses þ ICCejector 5 19.4 21.5 500.8 19.4 21.5 500.8
6 23.5 10.6 397.9 23.5 10.6 397.9
ð17Þ 7 24.5 10.6 397.9 24.5 10.6 397.9
8 299.9 4.30 282.3 315.8 4.30 282.3
In this study, the scaling up method is adopted to calculate the 9 22.9 4.30 282.3 24.3 4.30 282.3
investment of the equipment, which can be expressed as the 10 10.3 1.23 185.0 10.7 1.23 185.0
following equation [29]: 11 13.2 0.60 95.2 13.5 0.60 95.2
 f 12 11.8 0.22 62.4(0.967)a 12.0 0.22 62.4(0.967)a
S 13 264.6 0.06 35.4(0.915) 271.2 0.06 35.4(0.915)
ICC ¼ n  ICC0  ð18Þ
n  Sr 14 314.1 10.4 35.5 321.3 10.4 35.5
15 480.8 306.5 275.4 480.8 306.5 275.4
where S and f represent the scale parameter and scale factor in the 16 575.4 1.10 33.7 575.4 1.10 33.7
17 635.6 0.98 130.0 635.6 0.98 130.0
present scale, respectively. Sr denotes the scale parameter of a sin-
18 85.0 1.13 25.0 85.0 1.13 25.0
gle train of a reference component of size. n is the number of 19 65.5 1.13 103.0 79.0 1.13 62.0
equally sized trains operating at capacity of 100%/n. 20 25.3 4.30 282.3 8.0 4.30 282.3
The annual economic benefit can be used to evaluate the eco- 21 25.3 4.30 146.2 16.3 1.60 113.3
nomic performance of a power plant. In the drying power plant, 22 19.6 1.13 103.0 13.6 1.13 103.0
23 – – – 641.6 1.13 95.0
the annual economic benefit can be expressed as:
24 – – – 65.5 1.13 103.0
25 – – – 8.3 1.23 185.0
C t ¼ C p  ICC  ðCRF  ð1 þ aÞ þ O&MÞ  C c ð19Þ
a
The value in the bracket represents the dryness degree of the steam.
where C p and C c represent the annual electricity sales income and
coal cost, respectively; ICC represents the fixed capital investment;
O&M denotes the ratio of annual operating and management cost to
Table 7
ICC; a is the interest rate during construction; CRF is the capital Thermodynamic performance of the conventional and proposed LPDPPs.
recovery factor, which is determined by the annual discount rate
Item Conventional LPDPP Proposed LPDPP
(k) and the expected plant lifetime (l), and the calculation formula
can be expressed as [24]: Coal input rate (kg s1) 85.0 85.0
Boiler total energy input (MWth) 1417.2 1417.2
l Live steam mass flow rate (kg s1)
CRF ¼ k=½1  ð1 þ kÞ  ð20Þ 480.8 480.8
Gross electric power output (MWe) 613.9 619.9
The annual electricity sales income and coal cost can be Net electric power output (MWe) 580.1 585.8
obtained as the following formulas: Net efficiency (gnet , %) 42.4 42.8
Net heat rate 8491.4 8408.7
C p ¼ W net  N  w  ce ð21Þ Net heat rate reduction (kJ/kW h) 192.3 275.0
1154 G. Xu et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 107 (2016) 1145–1157

Heat Losses of the

Condenser
48.1%
Condenser

Boiler Steam Generation

Raw Coal Input
100.0% 92.7%
100.0% Net Electric
Steam
Turbine Power Output
41.5%

(a)

Dryer losses
0.9%
Dryer Heat Losses of the
Condenser
47.1%

Condenser
Raw Coal Input Boiler Steam Generation
100.0% 103.6% 97.0%
Steam Net Electric
Turbine Power Output
42.4%

(b)

Dryer losses
0.8%
Dryer Ċ Heat Losses of the
Condenser
48.1%
Condenser
Boiler Steam Generation
Raw Coal Input
103.6% 97.0%
100.0%
Steam Net Electric
Turbine Power Output
42.8%

Dryerĉ Dryer losses

0.1%

(c)
Fig. 7. Sankey diagrams of the reference power plant in % of the raw coal heat input (a), the conventional LPDPP (b) and the proposed LPDPP (c).
 G. Xu et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 107 (2016) 1145–1157
to 130 °C in the two LPDPPs. This is due to the moisture content
and mass flow rate of the flue gas decrease when the fired coal is
pre-dried and the acid dew point of flue gas will accordingly
decrease, thus a lower exhaust flue gas temperature of boiler can
be designed. (2) In the proposed LPDPP, the boiler exhaust flue
gas is used as heat source of the first stage pre-drying. Therefore,
its temperature further reduces from 130 °C to 95 °C, which will
eventually lead to a less boiler heat loss. (3) The mass flow rate
of the steam bleeds for drying decreases from 25.3 to 16.3 kg/s in
the proposed LPDPP. This is because part of waste heat of boiler
exhaust is recovered to the drying system and the raw lignite is
firstly pre-dried prior to the dryer using steam bleeds. (4) Com-
pared with the conventional one, the mass flow rate of the steam
extracted from RH5 reduces from 25.3 to 8.0 kg/s. This is because
in the conventional LPDPP, the steam for drying is only extracted
from RH5. While in the proposed one, the steam for drying is bled
from both RH5 and RH6.Moreover, a part of steam at RH6 is
entrained by the steam ejector, and the mass flow rate is
8.3 kg/s, which means more low-grade steam is used in the pro-
posed LPDPP and the energy grade of the steam for drying is cut
down. (5) Although the total energy inputs of the boiler in these
two LPDPPs are the same, the net electric power output of the pro-
posed LPDPP can reach 585.8 MWe, which is 5.7 MWe greater than
that of the conventional one. This is due to the quantity and quality
of steam bleeds for drying decrease and the work loss of steam
turbine brought by drying steam reduce.
To sum up, in the proposed LPDPP using both steam bleeds and
boiler exhaust flue gas, the net power plant efficiency could further
increase by 0.4% with the heat rate reduction of 82.7 kJ/kW h
relative to the conventional LPDPP. It should be noted that, the cal-
culation results above were based on the assumption that the coal
input rate of the three thermal systems was constant. If the net
electric power output was set as constant, the coal input rates of
the conventional LPDPP (83.2 kg/s) and the improved LPDPP
(82.4 kg/s) could decrease by 2.2% and 3.1% than that of the refer-
ence case (85.0 kg/s).
Sankey diagrams of the reference power plant and the two
LPDPPs are shown in Fig. 7. It is evident that the available energy
input of the boiler in the two LPDPPs would increase through firing
the dried lignite, and the work loss of the steam extracted for dry-
ing in the proposed LPDPP is lower than the conventional one.
From the results illustrated in Fig. 7, the following conclusions
could be obtained: (1) The available energy input brought by the
raw coal to the processes is maintained the same in the three cases,
which is illustrated as 100% in these three diagrams, and the total
boiler energy input of these two LPDPPs is 3.6% greater than that of
the reference case, due to the application of the coal pre-drying; (2)
In the conventional LPDPP, the heat for drying completely comes
from the steam extraction and 4.5% of the steam turbine’s energy
is extracted to heat and dry the raw lignite via steam rotary-tube
dryer. While in the proposed LPDPP, both exhaust flue gas and
steam bleeds serve as the drying heat source and 1.7% of the flue
gas’s waste heat is effectively recovered and beneficially utilized
to heat and dry the coal. Thus, the energy of steam extracted for
drying reduces from 4.5% to 2.9%; (3) In the conventional LPDPP,
the heat of the boiler exhaust flue gas reduces from 7.3% (the ref-
erence case) to 6.6%, this is because the temperature of boiler
exhaust decreases (as shown in Table 6), and in the proposed
one it further reduces to 4.9%, due to a portion of waste heat is
recovered for drying. (4) The available heat of the steam turbine
in these two LPDPPs increases from 92.7% to 97.0%. That is due
to the heat released in the furnace increases through firing the
dried lignite with the higher net heating value and then more feed
water can be heated and evaporate in the boiler. Thus, the mass
flow rate of the live steam in the two LPDPPs become larger and
more heat is brought to the steam turbine. (5) Finally, the net
1155
18
Work loss of steam turbine due to drying (MW)
Energy saving of the optimized LPDPP
16 Work loss of steam turbine due to drying
Č
14
12
ċ
10
8 ĉ
6
4 Ċ
2
0
Conventional LPDPP Optimazed LPDPP
Fig. 8. Comparison of work loss of steam turbine for the two LPDPPs.
energy efficiency of the proposed LPDPP can increase to 42.8%,
which is 1.3% larger than that of the reference case and 0.4%
greater than that of the conventional LPDPP.
Comparison of work loss of steam turbine for the two LPDPPs is
shown in Fig. 8. As explained above, for the two LPDPPs, there
would be some work loss of the steam turbine due to a part of
steam is required to be extracted for lignite drying. In the conven-
tional LPDPP, the mass flow rate of steam for drying is 25.3 kg/s
and the work loss of steam turbine can reach 14.5 MW (Area I in
Fig. 8). While in the proposed LPDPP, some waste heat of boiler
exhaust can be recovered to pre-dry the raw coal and the amount
of steam required for drying will reduce by 9.0 kg/s. So due to the
utilization of exhaust flue gas, the work loss can decrease by
5.0 MW (Area III). Besides, the steam ejector is employed in the
proposed LPDPP, which could eject a part of steam at RH6 and
reduce the parameters of steam for drying. Thus, the work loss
brought by the drying steam can further decrease by 1.0 MW (Area
IV) and finally it decreased to 8.5 MW (Area II).
In summary, a two-stage pre-drying system using both boiler
exhaust and steam bleeds is adopted to dry the lignite in the pro-
posed LPDPP, the quantity and energy grade of the drying steam
can both decrease significantly. Thus, the work loss of the steam
turbine brought by the drying steam can get lower and the power
plant will have a better thermodynamic performance.
5.2. Economic analysis
The calculations of the additional facilities’ investment are
listed in Table 8, and the basic assumptions for economic analysis
are listed in Table 9.
Table 10 shows the economic performance of two LPDPPs. The
following observations are derived from Tables 8 and 10: (1) In
the conventional LPDPP, one coal crusher, four steam dryers and
one bag houses are additionally equipped to dry the raw lignite,
so the total installed capital costs increase by $5.70 M, as compared
to the reference case. While in the proposed LPDPP, both flue gas
drying system and steam drying system are arranged, so the total
installed capital costs would further increase by $6.07 M, as com-
pared to the conventional LPDPP; (2) Compared with the conven-
tional LPDPP, the annual carrying changes and operating and
maintenance costs in the proposed LPDPP slightly increase by
$0.59 M and $0.24 M, due to the greater ICC of the drying power
plant. Meanwhile, the annual electricity sales incomes increase
by $1.92 M, due to the greater net electricity power outputs of
the proposed LPDPP; and (3) As a result, the COE of the proposed
LPDPP can be reduced to $44.40/(MW h), which is $0.19/(MW h)
1156 G. Xu et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 107 (2016) 1145–1157

Table 8
Basic capital cost data of facilities.

Component Reference FCI0a (M$) Reference scale Scale Scale factor b

Scale unit n FCI
Rotary dryer 4.00 200.0 306.0 0.80 Ton raw coal/h 2 6.46
Coal crusher 0.50 408.7 306.0 0.67 Ton raw coal/h 1 0.42
Bag house (Rotary dryer) 0.64 160.0 272.4 0.67 Volume flow rate (m3/h  104) 2 0.08
Steam dryer 1.32 18 48.9 0.80 Water evaporate flow rate (t/h) 3 3.66
Bag house (steam dryer) 0.64 160.0 7.40 0.67 Volume flow rate (m3/h  104) 1 0.08
Steam ejector 0.025 100.0 57.4 0.67 Outlet flow rate (t/h) 1 0.02
Total 11.77
a
The reference ICC is taken from Refs. [16,28].
b
The scale factor is taken from Refs. [30,31].

Table 9 lower than that of the conventional one and $0.97/(MW h) lower
Basic assumptions for economic analysis. than that of the reference power plant. Meanwhile, the net eco-
Items Values nomic benefit of the proposed LPDPP can reach $45.32 M, which
Annual discount rate (k) a
0.08
is $1.09 M greater than that of the conventional one. Thus,
Plant economic lifea (l) 30 yr although the total ICC increases by 2.4% as compared to the refer-
Interest during constructionc (a) 9.8% of ICC ence power plant, the proposed LPDPP could offer better economic
O&Ma 4% of ICC benefits than the conventional one.
Annual operation hours (N) 6900 h/yr
In fact, the grid feed-in tariff will fluctuate with the market
Annual capacity factor (w) 0.8
Grid feed-in tariff (ce) $0.061/kW h volatility, which will influence the additional net economic benefit
Coal priceb (ccoal) $3.05/GJ LHV of the proposed LPDPP. Besides, the lignite supply may vary in dif-
a
ferent seasons, so the capacity of the dryers may need to be
Plant economic lifetime, O&M, and discount rate were obtained from Refs.
[31,32].
designed larger to face with larger quantity of fuel to be dried at
b
The coal price is based on Ref. [6] according to China’s market condition. certain times. Thus, the ICC of the drying equipment may increase.
c
Taken from literature data [31]. Moreover, when choosing the drying equipment provided by dif-
ferent manufactures, the ICC of the drying equipment may also
fluctuate. Both these factors will also influence the performance
of the proposed LPDPP. Fig. 9 shows the additional net economic
Table 10
Economic performance of the conventional and the proposed LPDPPs. benefit of the proposed LPDPP as fluctuations of percent changes
in the grid feed-in tariff and additional ICC of the proposed LPDPP.
Items Conventional Proposed
Clearly, the additional net economic benefit of the proposed
LPDPP LPDPP
LPDPP increased as grid feed-in tariff increased, but showed a
Total installed capital costs (ICC, M$) 495.70 501.77
decrease with the increase of the additional ICC of the proposed
Annual carrying charges (CRF ð1 þ aÞ ICC, M$) 48.35 48.94
Operating and maintenance costs (O&M  ICC, M$) 19.83 20.07 system. Quantitatively, when the grid feed-in tariff increase by
Annual electricity sales income (Cc, M$) 82.94 82.94 20%, the additional net economic benefit can increase from
The unit cost of electricity (COE, $/(MW h)) 44.59 44.40 $4.63 M to $5.88 M in the proposed LPDPP. By contrast, when the
Annual electricity sales income (Cp, M$) 195.34 197.26 additional ICC of the proposed LPDPP increased by 20%, the addi-
Net economic benefit (Ct, M$) 44.23 45.32
tional net economic benefit just slightly decreased from $4.63 M
Net economic benefit increase (DCt, M$) +3.54 +4.63
to $4.30 M. It is obvious that the economic performance of the

6.0 6.0
Additional net economic benefit (M$)
Additional net economic benefit (M$)

5.5 5.5

5.0 5.0

4.5 4.5

4.0 4.0

3.5 3.5

3.0 3.0

-20 -10 0 10 20 -20 -10 0 10 20

Variation in grid feed-in tariff (%) Variation in ICC of the proposed LPDPP (%)

Fig. 9. Influence of the grid feed-in tariff and ICC of the proposed LPDPP on the additional net economic benefit.
 G. Xu et al. / Applied Thermal Engineering 107 (2016) 1145–1157
improved LPDPP was more sensitive to the grid feed-in tariff and
relatively less sensitive to the addition ICC of the power plant. This
is due to the fact that electric power is the sole product of the
power plant and the grid feed-in tariff will directly influence the
annual electricity sales income. While, the influence of the addi-
tional ICC on the economic benefit will be weakened by the factor
of CRF. Thus, within a wide range of fluctuations of power market
conditions, the proposed LPDPP could still offer a good economic
performance.
6. Conclusions
An integrated system of lignite pre-drying using both steam
bleeds and exhaust flue gas in a lignite fired power plant has been
proposed in this study. Based on a 600 MW supercritical condens-
ing CLPP, thermodynamics and economics analyses are performed,
and some meaningful conclusions can be obtained:
(1) The electric generation efficiency of a CLPP can be increased
by lignite pre-drying using steam bleeds from the steam tur-
bine. However, large amount of steam is normally required
to remove the moisture content of raw lignite to an expected
extent, which would lead to a loss of work of the turbine and
restrict the thermal efficiency of a conventional LPDPP.
(2) In the proposed LPDPP, a two-stage pre-drying system is
adopted to dry the lignite and both boiler exhaust flue gas
and steam extractions are used as drying heat sources. Thus,
a part of waste heat of boiler exhaust can be recovered and
the amount of steam required for drying will reduce from
25.3 kg/s to 16.3 kg/s.
(3) In the proposed LPDPP, the steam ejector is employed in the
pre-drying system, which can eject a part of steam at RH6
and reduce the amount of steam extracted from RH5 for dry-
ing. Thus, the energy grade of drying steam can get lower
and the work loss of steam turbine brought by the drying
steam can decrease from 14.5 MW to 8.5 MW.
(4) Net power efficiency of the proposed LPDPP can further
increase by 0.4% with the heat rate reduction of 82.7 kJ/
kW h as compared to the conventional one. Besides, the
additional net economic benefit can reach $4.63 M, which
is $1.09 M greater than that of the conventional one,
although the total installed capital costs increase slightly.
Acknowledgements
This paper is supported by the National Basic Research Program
of China (Grant No. 2015CB251504), the Fundamental Research
Funds for the Central Universities (No. 2015ZZD10), and the
National Nature Science Fund of China (No. 51476053, No.
51436006).
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