Renowable Energy - Power Plants

   A thermal power station transforms the Chemical energy of a fuel (gas, coal, fuel oil) into electric power. Also thermal power stations can be considered to be those that work with nuclear power. It is an installation where the mechanical energy that it is necessary to move the generator and therefore to obtain the electric power, to be obtained from the steam formed on having boiled the water in a boiler. All the thermal power stations follow a cycle of production of steam destined for the operation of the turbines that move the rotor of the alternator.

Phases:
     1. There is used as fuel, generally, a derivative of the oil called fuel oil - oil, though there are coal or gas head offices. This fuel burns in a boiler and the heat build-up is transmitted to water.

     2. There warms up the liquid water that has been pumped up to a coil of warming (system of pipelines). The water warming takes place thanks to a boiler that obtains energy of the combustion of the fuel (pulverized coal, fuel oil or gas).

     3. The liquid water happens to transform in steam; this steam is humid and slightly energetic.

     4. There is overheated the steam that becomes dry, up to high temperatures and pressures.

    5. The overheated steam happens for a system of conduction and is liberated up to a turbine, provoking his movement great speed, that is to say, we generate mechanical energy.

     6. The turbine is connected to an alternator jointly that, finally, produces the electric power.

    7. In this final stage, the steam cools, becomes condensed and returns to the liquid state. The installation where the condensation takes place is called a condenser. The liquid water forms a part of a closed circuit and it will return again to the boiler, previous warming. To refresh the steam it uses one resorts to water of a river or of the sea, which must be refreshed in towers of refrigeration.

NOTES: not to confuse the steam of the water that moves the turbine with the water that refreshes the steam. They are two elements different from the process. The water of refrigeration does not move the turbines. The electrical current is generated to approximately 20000 volts of tension and passes to the transformers to raise the tension up to approximately 400000 volts, for his movement up to the points of consumption.

NOTES: If the thermal power station is of coal, this one is stored as it comes from the mine and moves by means of a moving belt up to the chute, wherefrom it passes to a mill in the one that is crushed up to remaining turned into thin powder that burns easier. Later it is mixed by preheated air and gets in the boiler.

If the used fuel is a fuel oil, this one is stored in warehouses as it comes from the refinery and after being warmed, behaves from them to the boiler; if the thermal power station is of gas, this one goes on from the tanks of storage to the boiler experiencing also a warm-up.

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