In the power plant that I retired from, we started out with Bituminous coal only. Then they thought they could save money by burning Powder River Basin (PRB) coal. I calculated that in my time operating the power plant, I have burned nearly 5 million tons of coal. I can tell you from experience the PRB coal is like trying to burn mud. Very very low BTU content. Our units were de-rated because of the low BTU content of PRB, so I don't know if they ended up coming out ahead or not. It made it difficult for us operators, though, because the plant wasn't designed to burn that type of coal.
I thought they started converting to PRB coal due to sulfur dioxide emissions restrictions making most other medium and high sulfur coals uneconomic to burn.
@@gregorymalchuk272 Coal plants have now installed catalytic converters that reacts to turn SO2 into SO3. Then they have scrubbers that take the SO3 and run it through a slurry of limestone/water and it takes the SO3 and limestone and turns it into gypsum. I can't quote the chemical equation, but that's what happens. There may have been a sulfur consideration, but I think the biggest reason is that it's cheap because it has such a low BTU content.
I love your videos, thanks for the visuals. The examples help tremendously.
In the power plant that I retired from, we started out with Bituminous coal only. Then they thought they could save money by burning Powder River Basin (PRB) coal. I calculated that in my time operating the power plant, I have burned nearly 5 million tons of coal. I can tell you from experience the PRB coal is like trying to burn mud. Very very low BTU content. Our units were de-rated because of the low BTU content of PRB, so I don't know if they ended up coming out ahead or not. It made it difficult for us operators, though, because the plant wasn't designed to burn that type of coal.
I thought they started converting to PRB coal due to sulfur dioxide emissions restrictions making most other medium and high sulfur coals uneconomic to burn.
@@gregorymalchuk272 Coal plants have now installed catalytic converters that reacts to turn SO2 into SO3. Then they have scrubbers that take the SO3 and run it through a slurry of limestone/water and it takes the SO3 and limestone and turns it into gypsum. I can't quote the chemical equation, but that's what happens. There may have been a sulfur consideration, but I think the biggest reason is that it's cheap because it has such a low BTU content.
It’s called by-tumb- in-iss
Learn to read the words written on your own slides!
"Bitumous [sic]" -- you're missing a syllable: / baɪˈtu mə nəs, -ˈtyu-, bɪ- /