A Mathematical Model for Oxygen Mass Balance in a 7.5MW FBC Power Plant using Cotton Stalk

Abstract

Due to urbanization and industrialization, there is increase in demand for more energy sources. This will increase burden on the natural resources and fossil fuels day by day. These resources are depleting at such a fast rate that, they may finished up very quickly. In order to reduce this burden for increased demand of energy sources, use of biomass is a good alternative. Biomass is an important resource and with the help of fluidized bed combustion process it can be effectively converted into thermal energy and hence for power generation. India is basically an agri-based nation. So the availability of biomass is not a problem. We can use this biomass for the generation of the power that will meet the required demand in today scenario. In India, fluidized bed combustion technology is gradually emerging as a potential technology. A number of small scale fluidized bed combustion power plants have been commissioned in India in the recent past as a result, a large amount of data is available for modeling and simulation. In the present work, a three phase mathematical model for oxygen mass balance in a atmospheric bubbling fluidized bed boiler at Malwa power limited, Muktsar, Punjab has been developed. In this model some input parameters taken from the plant have been used in order to find out the physico-chemical parameters like minimum fluidization velocity, bubble diameter etc. Then these physico-chemical parameters are incorporated in the mathematical model to find out the percentage of oxygen, carbon dioxide and nitrogen. It has been assumed that the bubble diameter remains constant along the bed height and the fluidized bed is assumed to consist of number of equivalent stages such that each stage height is equal to the bubble diameter. Then the results have been compared with the plant data and reasonable agreement is obtained.