www.energycentral.com EnErgyBiz 57www.energycentral.com EnErgyBiz 57

GUIDEBOOk «READ REGULARLY UPDATED INFORMATION ABOUT GENERATION TECHNOLOGIES: WWW.ENERGYCENTRAL.COM/GT.CFM

The boom is OnGENERATION WORk ON MANY FRONTS

bY WILLIAM OPALkA

UnrelentIng grOwth In pOwer consumption, a switch to cleaner energy

sources, pollution control efforts and pent-up demand for new generation sources after a slowdown in new plant construction have all combined to create a boom in power plant building in recent years.

The power plant boom may continue because of this demand, even with a credit crisis that gained steam in the summer and caused stock markets to plunge in the fall. Large plants that take years to plan and then construct can’t simply be stopped once they reach a certain point.

Total power construction spending last year reached $53.4 billion, a 34 percent increase from $39.8 billion in 2006, according to new figures released by the U.S. Census Bureau. According to published reports from the construction industry, the engineering segment of this spending in 2007 reached $7.2 billion, up 46 percent from $4.9 billion in 2006.

The demand for energy is expected to grow 30 percent by the year 2030 and the United States will need to build 151 gigawatts of new generation by that time, according to the Brattle Group, which performed

GENERATION TECHNOLOGIES

58 EnErgyBiz November/December 2008

a study for the Edison Electric Institute. A high level of construction and investment has

occurred for a number of years, including greater interest in renewable energy and in gas generation due to the speed with which it can be built, but a slowdown in coal because of the uncertainty. In recent years as utilities and independent power producers made sense of the deregulated environment, not a great number of plants were built even though power demand continued to increase and demand for new generation became increasingly pent up.

One factor that may have skewed recent con-struction spending is projects and plans to cut sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions from coal-fired plants in 28 states, mostly in the Midwest, as directed by the Environmental Protection agency three years ago.

In the Clean Air Interstate Rule decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia over the summer struck down a 2005 directive from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency that sought to reduce the amount of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide from power plants in one state that then settle downwind in another. The EPA has asked the Court of Appeals for a rehearing. The case could still end up in front of the U.S. Supreme Court in a year or later before it is finally decided. But since the summer ruling, some utilities have ceased or scaled back spending on these construction projects while await-ing the outcome of the case. The amount by which this may cut anticipated expenditures in the coming months and until the case is resolved is not yet known.

Natalie Rolph, principal economist at Black & Veatch, said the ruling’s impact is not entirely clear. “This has to be put in the context of new versus exist-ing plants since the CAIR rule was vacated. The year 2008 saw a heavy amount of construction for SOx and NOx control on existing generation. You might expect a slowdown or at least some of the projects will be put on hold.”

But that uncertainty has propelled the interest — along with favorable tax treatment and state mandates — in renewable energy, particularly wind. A yearlong extension of the production tax credit was included in the financial bailout bill, which will keep the 2-cent per kilowatt subsidy in place through 2009. Also, about 30 states now have a renewable energy portfolio standard mandating that a percentage of electricity sales come from renewable energy by a fixed date. Wind is the primary beneficiary of this policy.

Wind generation claimed an investment spike of $9 billion in 2007 when it added 5,244 megawatts of capacity. That number was exceeded in September of

this year, which is sure to set yet another record for the most popular form of renewable energy. Other alterna-tive forms of power generation have seen increases as well, though none is nearly as dramatic. The United States ceded its leadership in solar installed capacity several years ago but it is expected to make an impact soon. RPS policies in California, Colorado and New Jersey, with set-asides for solar photovoltaic genera-tion, will see the fastest growth in the coming years.

But according to industry sources, geography does not play a significant role in the overall demand for power. Some particular state activity may seem RPS-dependent, for instance, but planning is proceeding on all fronts. Engineers and consultants are reluctant to give breakdowns on their own order books for the types of construction projects they are involved in, be it coal, nuclear, natural gas, wind, solar or biomass.

Solar photovoltaics are growing in the United States, with at least 450 megawatts installed. Utilities are expanding rooftop PV capacity and Southern California Edison plans to install 250 megawatts of distributed capacity over 65 million square feet of

» GUIDEBOOk (GeneratiOn technOlOGies)

www.energycentral.com EnErgyBiz 59

roofs in the next five years. Pacific Gas & Electric plans to help California’s goal of 3,000 megawatts of customer-installed solar power by 2017.

Planned investments in nuclear power have prompted one company to expand its operations. Engineering and construction firm URS is investing $6.5 million for a Nuclear Center in Fort Mill, S.C. URS works closely with Duke Power, which has promoted new nuclear power and coal-fired plants in its growth strategy.

But with coal providing half of domestic electricity, some worry about stalled projects. Richard Rudden, Black & Veatch senior vice president and energy industry leader, said most coal projects have been delayed as people grapple with the carbon issue. “Most construction now still is natural gas combined cycle,” he said.

The cancellation of coal plants has been felt most acutely in projects that were recently planned but then killed in the past year or two. According to Rudden, new capacity to committed generation is 4 percent to coal, 26 percent combined cycle natural gas, 22 percent renewable, 6 percent single cycle natural gas, and 2 percent landfill gas.

In current planning for new renewable energy,

64 percent involves wind. No surprise there. But sur-prisingly, 27 percent is in hydropower — much of that in Canada — 5 percent solar, 2 percent geothermal and 1 percent biomass.

Rising construction costs affect all new genera-tion projects, according to the Cambridge Energy Research Associates’ power capital costs index calculated this year. The index shows the cost of new power plant construction in North America increased 27 percent in the 12 months preceding the February report and 19 percent in the previous six months, reaching a level 130 percent higher than in 2000. Rising commodity prices, particularly for construction materials, bore much of the responsibility.

The credit crisis is also expected to have an impact, as financing projects becomes more difficult and costly. The political landscape is not expected to cause any decrease in investment. Carbon mitigation, through either a cap-and-trade system or a tax, is expected by nearly everyone to become law within the next few years.

Despite all these hazards, utilities will be under pressure to increase capacity. “There will be a slowing in the increase, not an overall decline,” said Black & Veatch’s Rudden.

The ZoloBOSS™ is a laser-based sensor which

requires only a line of sight to measure through ultra-harsh

environments.

Measure Where it Counts

Measure where it counts…directly in the heart of the combustion process.

The ZoloBOSS™ measures O2, CO, CO2, H2O, and temperatureand can see through the most challenging environments, even right in the combustion zone.There are no probes to insert or sensitive electronics near the boiler to wear out.

Other sensors measure at a single point in the back-pass. Only the ZoloBOSS™ allows real-time mappingof multiple constituents simultaneously in the back-pass and the combustion zone.

Multiple heads direct lasers across the boiler. Each path across the boiler measures average concentrations, butarranged in a grid, the ZoloBOSS™ creates a tomographic map for multiple constituents simultaneously. Balance andfine-tune your boiler and make your measurement dollars count.

Measure where no one else can.Better Measurements Mean Better Results

4946 North 63rd Street, Boulder, CO 80301 USAsales@zolotech.com 303 604 5800

www.zolotech.com

60 EnErgyBiz November/December 2008

generatIOn Is One Of the majOr issues facing the United States utility industry —

what kind, where to get it, and how to have enough of it. Projections by the North American Electric Reliability Corp. do not look promising over the next 10 to 20 years, as environmental pressures impede the building of new baseload and renewable technologies are not yet ready to take up the slack. As a result, keeping the existing fleet of coal-fired, gas-fired, nuclear and hydroelectric generation systems operat-ing and in good repair is becoming increasingly critical every day while legislators and regulators decide what to do about the impending electric shortage.

Actually, the U.S. generation fleet has an excel-lent safety and reliability record to draw upon — especially on the nuclear side where the only acci-dent ever recorded, at Three Mile Island, harmed no one and safety systems worked as designed to prevent a serious problem. But it may be becoming more difficult to keep that record intact. Generating

plants are expensive, complex and increasingly aged. Parts do wear out and many of the parts in the U.S. generation fleet were installed in the 1970s or before, especially in the nuclear fleet. Pending problems are not difficult to find.

“One company is trying to refurbish and refuel one of its nuclear plants and when I visited, the hallways looked like geriatric wards,” said one utility official who visited the plant and rightfully asked for anonymity. “These plants were built so long ago, with none having been built in more than 30 years, that the only engineers who know how to work on them are now often retired. This outfit had to call a lot of them out of retirement to get the work done.”

Coal- and gas-fired plants have continued to be built and many of them are quite modern. However, a lot of them also are aged and even the new ones require periodic maintenance and there are increasingly fewer trained personnel to do the work. There are other issues, as well. Utilities have

keeping the lights OnExTENDING THE LIFE OF AGED GENERATION

bY WARREN CAUSEY

» GUIDEBOOk (GeneratiOn technOlOGies)

It’s incredible what can be achieved with the right combination of resources and energy

Solutions for Energy from Pre-feasibility to Operations and SupportOur services to the Power industry cover the full asset spectrum both in size and lifecycle – from the creation of new assets to services that sustain and improve operating assets. Through our comprehensive global network, our extensive expertise and local presence allows us to offer tailored solutions to our customers for renewable energy, advanced coal, nuclear and natural gas generation, transmission networks and retrofit projects.

EcoNomics™ - Environmental and social imperatives now affect the bottom line for all major corporations and projects globally, which are particularly challenging in the resources and energy sectors. WorleyParsons is uniquely positioned to work both globally and locally with our customers to deliver on the value of EcoNomics™. Our range of services and technologies embed environmental, social, and financial sustainability into project delivery, across the asset lifecycle.www.worleyparsons.com

Write to: Power@worleyparsons.com for complete information.

Interested in employment opportunities? Visit our web site at: www.worleyparsons.com/employment

32,200Personnel

38Countries

118Offices

62 EnErgyBiz November/December 2008

had to cut back on expenditures so much to meet other demands, that there often aren’t enough people to do some of the work.

“From a maintenance point of view, today we are in a situation where the vast majority of fossil plants receive more reactive than proactive maintenance,” says Anthony M. “Mac” Smith, AMS Associates, San Jose, Calif., who has more than 25years of experience in plant preventive maintenance and who is the author of two books on the subject of reliability-centered maintenance. “In a recent project with a coal-fired plant, we found that their preventa-tive maintenance program had 17 people five to seven years ago, now they have two.”

This shortage of trained personnel is forcing many utilities to go to automated preventive maintenance systems, including remote sensing devices. But that is another expensive proposition in a time when there are many competing demands on utility budgets.

“We’re currently installing 20 remote wireless sensors on each of our plants,” says Keith Cooke, chief information officer for Energy Northwest, in Richland, Wash., a joint operating generating agency serving 22 utilities. “From the intelligent utility perspective, the desire is to do more with fewer people. The only way to do that is through automation. New control systems that come in are digital. They use digital communications. For example, a new valve uses a slider system on a touch-screen computer instead of dispatching an equipment operator out to turn a valve by hand.”

However, such systems are expensive, if and when they are necessary in the current environ-ment. Cooke says one of his major concerns as a CIO is installing the necessary technology to keep

plants operating while competing for funding with other priorities.

Smith says he is concerned that many utilities are not winning that battle.

“From a maintenance standpoint, the vast major-ity of fossil plants are in more of a reactive than proactive mode,” Smith says. “In some cases plant maintenance personnel are just overwhelmed, just trying to keep their heads above water rather than doing preventive maintenance. They just don’t have the manpower to spare. But I tell them that they can’t afford not to do it. Some understand, and a lot don’t.”

Smith says the problems are similar, if not quite as drastic, at nuclear plants that have to meet stringent regulatory requirements on maintenance. “Nuclear Power, since TMI-2, has had a remarkable safety and performance record. But they are aging, and face the same critical probem now confronting all of U.S industry – a lack of skilled craft techni-cians to replace an experienced workforce that is retiring. This is a major concern”

Despite these problems, however, U.S. baseload generating plants continue to churn out electricity for an increasingly power-hungry culture. All those iPods and laptops require increasing supplies. And that isn’t to mention plug-in vehicles that will be power hogs and that are increasingly being pushed, particularly in Washington and other states on the West Coast. And, the plants still are generating electricity safely and efficiently.

More attention will have to be paid to proactive preventive maintenance, however, if that sterling record is to be maintained, Smith says. “The secret is to remember the 80/20 rule,” he says. “Your heartache and pain comes from 20 percent of the plants and that’s where you need to put the most emphasis.”

Smith says while virtually all modern plants have various computerized maintenance management software systems, a lot of them are not being properly utilized. “If you spend all that money to put in a sophisticated CMMS, but don’t put any key performance indicators into them, you will be caught by surprise. Too many plants just don’t measure what is going on, and hence are at a loss as to how to make improvements – better yet, how to avoid major outages and costly corrective maintenance”. With global warming, windmills, solar panels, drilling for oil and a host of other issues dominating all the headlines and carrying eye-popping price tags, people such as Smith, Cooke and others are beginning to worry that not enough attention is being paid to keeping the basic generation fleet on line.

» GUIDEBOOk (GeneratiOn technOlOGies)

From the INTELLIGENT UTILITY pERSpECTIVE, the desire is to do more with fewer people. The only way to do that is through automation.

With a closed loop cooling system, no need for process water, no waste

water treatment and no disposal, Wärtsilä Technology makes water

worries a thing of the past. It also limits NOx levels to single digits that

meet even California’s stringent standards, and has the highest simple

cycle efficiency in the industry. Today, with over 36,000 MW installed,

Wärtsilä is making a difference for customers

around the globe. Get to know the difference

we can make for you.

WÄ

RT

SIL

Ä®

isa

regi

ster

edtr

adem

ark.

WÄRTSILÄ TECHNOLOGY MEANS NO PROCESS WATER CONSUMPTION.

WARTSILA.COM/POWER

64 EnErgyBiz November/December 2008

UtIlIty plant managers tOday face a number of critical challenges, primarily

evolving from the axiom, “Do more with less.” Power plants are expected to generate more electricity, comply with increasingly stringent environmental requirements and reduce outage times while operating with smaller budgets.

Managers also are responsible for ensuring the safety of their workers and training new employees, even as some of the most experienced employees are retiring.

Faced with these challenges, plant managers and their staffs must develop creative and practical strat-egies for solving problems. But these strategies are unlikely to be found in any manual, which is why the best help comes from plant managers themselves. With the expertise of the Electric Power Research Institute, 20 plant managers from utilities gathered in August 2007 for the first in a series of workshops

designed to share experiences and lessons learned related to operation and maintenance, all geared to find solutions to improve plant performance. There have been two more workshops since then.

Earlier this year, seven representatives of six utilities were awarded EPRI’s Technology Transfer Award for their vision and unselfish leadership in creating new ways for plant manager peers to share expertise, solutions and best practices to improve plant operations.

As part of its Operations and Maintenance Excellence initiative, the first EPRI workshop’s theme was workforce solutions and had an agenda organized and presented by a core team of plant managers from DTE Energy, Dynegy, Entergy, Kansas City Power & Light, Progress Energy and the Tennessee Valley Authority.

Workshop subjects were knowledge capture, managing human performance, instilling safety

awareness, attracting quality low-cost contractors, retaining top talent and training new employ-ees. The second workshop topics included measurement-based business process, alarm management, maintenance productivity, strategies for aging plant infrastructure and improve-ments through benchmarking.

The plant managers developed issues for each of the topics and the group then discussed and charted key take-aways. For the six issues in the first workshop, about 70 take-aways were devel-oped that now can be used by the participants and their companies.

kNOWLEDGE TRANSFER

One key topic was knowledge transfer, precipitated by the fact that utilities are facing multiple challenges in maintaining their talent pool.

From a recruitment standpoint,

knowledge managementDOING MORE WITH LESS

bY FRANk WSzELAkI

» GUIDEBOOk (Guest OpiniOn)

monroe Power Plant, about 40 miles south of detroit, is a 3,000-megawatt, coal-fired

power plant that started operations in 1971. Photo CourtEsy oF dtE EnErgy

www.energycentral.com EnErgyBiz 65

there is a shrinking pool of desirable candidates, hiring freezes and competition from more lucrative and cutting-edge industries. Retaining employees is also difficult because of companies that poach employees and because of cost reductions. Compounding the problem is that an aging work-force — the average utility worker is 44 and the average craft worker is 50 — may result in increased sickness, disability and significant retirement numbers in the near future.

One of the biggest countermeasures to the latter problem is to focus more on knowledge management to preserve intellectual assets and to specifically develop knowledge transfer guides for both positions and processes. In addition, it’s important to maintain relationships with key retirees for knowledge creation and project work.

In the retention and development area, DTE Energy has rolled out a significant performance leadership effort focused on inspirational leadership development and talent management. The company has empowered frontline employees to assume greater problem solving and leadership responsibility. In addition, DTE Energy placed a greater focus on talent planning by identifying critical positions and developing a talent pipeline.

Knowledge management activities can be precisely designed to overcome specific barriers. DTE Energy, for example, documents its current assignment and contact list. It has templates for positions and processes as well as lessons learned, process maps and stand work instructions. Departments share that information through meetings, job shadowing and understudies, and developmental assignments.

Then, individual employees’ development plans can be used as an effective tool to ensure knowledge transfer. Employees provide managers with their performance and professional goals and managers then determine what their developmental needs are to attain those goals. Managers also include employees’ personality profiles and working styles, as well as a plan for managers to help employees reach their goals.

This is just one example of the work that has been done as a result of EPRI’s involvement in continuous improvement in the electric utility industry. Moving forward, results will be shared throughout the industry at various forums and meetings devoted to making power plants more cost competitive in an ever-more-competitive operating environment.

Frank Wszelaki is director of DTE Energy’s Monroe power plant.

The Energy

Industry Changes

Fast.

Energy Central’s Topic Centers keep you up to speed.http://topics.energycentral.com Your source for up-to-the-minute news, intelligent views, upcoming industry events and insightful commentary.

Energy Central’s Topic Centers keep you up to speed.http://topics.energycentral.com Your source for up-to-the-minute news, intelligent views, upcoming industry events and insightful commentary.

Asset ManagementBilling & Bill PaymentCustomer Care & Business OperationsGeneration TechnologiesMetering, AMR & Data ManagementMobile Workforce ManagementT&D AutomationWind Power

66 EnErgyBiz November/December 2008

a new COal COmpOsItIOn analysIs technique aims to give electric utility generating

station operators real-time information that could significantly improve the efficiency of their plants.

Specifically, the technology, when deployed in a plant, will act as an early warning system to alert operators whether the particular batch of coal they are about to burn has a high likelihood of producing slag.

Slagging occurs when coal ash accumulates around the pipes that carry steam inside a power plant boiler. It reduces heat transfer from the flue gas to the steam tubes and decreases a plant’s efficiency. Some industry sources estimate that slagging and associated prob-lems cost coal-fired power plants $2.4 billion each year.

The new technique uses a laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy system developed by Energy Research in Staten Island, N.Y., and artificial intelligence-based neural network software developed by Energy Research Center at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pa.

The development work for this project is being funded by the U.S. Department of Energy. In tests in the lab and at the Brayton Point Station in Somerset, Mass., a laser vaporizes a sample of coal and determines its composition.

This data typically would be used to build a calibra-tion curve to determine ash fusion temperature.

The twist here is that the neural net software carries out this analysis automatically. “The software mimics the way the brain works,” said Carlos Romero, princi-pal researcher at Lehigh’s Energy Research Center.

Interest in slag prediction is on the rise due to the changing nature of the coal market.

As worldwide demand for coal grows, so too does its price. To save money and meet growing customer electricity usage demands, plant owners increasingly are buying coal on the spot market where the compo-sition and quality of the coal can vary significantly. To that point, depending on the composition, some coals produce more slag than others. That’s true even with coal from a single mine where coal from different veins can have different characteristics.

Traditionally, dealing with slag has been reactive. Once it accumulates, steps are taken to address it. For instance, soot could be blown off pipes or the burning process could be altered to try to reduce the produc-tion of ash and slag.

But the new technology will allow operators to be

pro-active and take steps to reduce slag before the coal is burned. “This gives the operator a production advantage,” said Robert De Saro, president of Energy Research. He notes the current methods of dealing with slag are equivalent to baking a cake and then determin-ing if it has the right combination of sugar, flour and eggs versus knowing what’s in the mix beforehand and making changes before baking the cake.

The current work on this technology is in the devel-opment stage. The full-scale system at the Brayton Point Station has been used in offline tests. Additional funding would be used to automate the analysis while coal is going to a burner.

Knowing the slagging tendencies of coal before it is burned allows plant operators to take a number of steps to improve operations.

For example, knowing a batch of coal is likely to produce more slag, a plant operator could be more diligent about blowing soot off of pipes. But Romero cautions that plant operators typically do not like to do this too often because it can stress pipes and tubes. It also wastes steam.

A better approach would be to use the information and mix coals with different characteristics to average out the slag-producing potential.

Alternatively, if a plant has different types of fur-naces, operators might be able to divert high-slag-pro-ducing coal to a more forgiving burner. This shuffling of coal to more suitable furnaces could also be done when an operator oversees multiple plants.

Another approach would be to modify the burning process to reduce the amount of ash produced. For instance, the operator might opt to introduce more air to reduce or mitigate slagging.

And the technology could also link coal inspection to the purchasing process, making sure a plant does not buy the more troublesome coal again.

The composition information might also be used in the future for other purposes. For instance, if a batch of coal has high sulfur content, it might be diverted to a plant with scrubbers.

And longer term, the team hopes to develop other capabilities such as determining the heating value of a batch of coal. Potentially, plants might also use the technology to detect traces of mercury, arsenic and chlorine, which are corrosive.

shining a laser on CoalAVOIDING SLAG HEADACHES

bY SALVATORE SALAMONE

» GUIDEBOOk (GeneratiOn technOlOGies)

25The long-buried secret of reliable power delivery and reduced cost.

It’s been 25 years since the first instal-lation of underground power cable withtree retardant crosslinkable insulationmaterial from Dow Wire & Cable. Samplesof underground cable installed in 1983show little wear today.

EPRI* says about our Dow 4202 family ofproducts, “Based on research results andfield data, it appears that the servicelife…will be greater than 40 years.”

Our patented technology provides anextra-clean and highly cost-effective mate-rial system. Cable is easy to install and

gives you exceptionally long and depend-able service life. Cable made with Dow4202 insulation materials is a solid in-vestment in dependable power deliveryfor generations to come–with sales andtechnical support from locations aroundthe world.

Ask your cable supplier where they gottheir materials. It shouldn’t be a secret. Itshould be Dow Wire & Cable.

Contact Dow Wire & Cable: w w w . d o w w i r e a n d c a b l e . c o mIn Europe: 00800 3 694 6367 (800 783 825 from Italy, 990 3 694 6367 from Finland) / In USA and Canada: 1-800-441-4DOW / In Asia Pacific + 800-7776-7776 / Use reference #1-2GN25I®Trademark of The Dow Chemical Company Dow Wire & Cable is a global business unit of The Dow Chemical Company and its subsidiaries.*Electric Power Research Institute

NOTICE: No freedom from infringement of any patent owned by Dow or others is to be inferred. Because use conditions and applicable laws may differ from one location to another and may change with time, the Customer isresponsible for determining whether products and the information in this document are appropriate for the Customer’s use and for ensuring that the Customer’s workplace and disposal practices are in compliance with applicablelaws and other governmental enactments. Dow assumes no obligation or liability for the information in this document. NO WARRANTIES ARE GIVEN; ALL IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE EXPRESSLY EXCLUDED.

HM070w&c_25yrs_enduser_ebiz_ad042108 4/21/08 9:08 AM Page 1