Proceedings of ES2008

Energy Sustainability 2008

August 10-14, 2008, Jacksonville, Florida, USA

ES2008-54268

PRESSURISED OXY-COAL COMBUSTION RANKINE-CYCLE FOR FUTURE

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ZERO EMISSION POWER PLANTS: PROCESS DESIGN AND ENERGY ANALYSIS

Marco Gazzino Giancarlo Benelli

Enel Produzione S.p.A.

Divisione Ingegneria e Innovazione – Ricerca
Via Andrea Pisano, 120, I-56122, Pisa (ITALY)
marco.gazzino@enel.it

ABSTRACT
This paper presents the process design and the energy
analysis for a coal-fired power plant based on pressurised oxy-
coal combustion and including carbon capture technologies. A
combustion technology performing a pressurised combustion of
coal in an atmosphere of O2/CO2/H2O and including flue gases
recycling has been selected. Combustion and steam production
occur in separated equipments and the combustor’s design
allows achieving high ash removal efficiency.
The Rankine cycle has been chosen as the most viable
thermodynamic cycle in a short-term scenario. Oxygen
required by the combustion process is supplied by a cryogenic
Air Separation Unit (ASU) and a double-reheat
ultrasupercritical cycle is employed with main steam conditions
of 250bar/605°C and reheat steam temperatures of
605°C/620°C. All choices related to thermal cycle selection and
process design have been conducted upon the principle of
feasibility and reliability.
In order to increase net plant efficiency both sensible and
latent heat is recovered from the flue gas stream before entering
the purification and compression section. By operating in
pressure it becomes possible to recover a larger amount of heat
than in the atmospheric case. As a result, all low pressure steam
bleedings and the corresponding regenerative heat exchangers
can be eliminated.
Process simulation is carried out in the paper and the
expected efficiency is evaluated, as well as other cycle
performance parameters. Since a relevant benefit may arise
from the combustion of cheap coals, the impact of burning
high-ash content and low ash-fusion-temperature coals is
assessed. The impact of energy penalties associated to oxygen
production and the benefit arising from high heat-transfer
coefficients due to the increased pressure of the flue gas are
deeply investigated.
INTRODUCTION
Over the past decade, coal held steady as the world’s
primary fuel for electric power generation. According to its
availability, stability of supply and sale cost, coal is expected to
continue its relevance into the future (MIT, 2007; IEA, 2005;
Saha, 2003; IEA, 1999; Zhou e Zhou, 1999). Since coal is more
carbon intensive than natural gas and oil, the increasing
concern for CO2 emissions pushed for the integration of
Carbon Capture and Sequestration (CCS) technologies into
coal fired power plants (Sarofim, 2004; Otter, 2003), together
with enhancement of renewable and nuclear power generation,
as well as improvements in power plant efficiencies, which are
important both for short term and for long term solutions
reducing CO2. With the purpose to realize a highly efficient
energy conversion, several cycles, layouts and advanced
combustion technologies have been proposed for CO2 capture
(Milani and Saponaro, 2001; Wall, 2006; Beér, 2006).
In the short term, efficiency increase is a viable way to
limit CO2 emissions. Moreover, high efficiency in energy
conversion will allow mitigating energy penalties associated to
CCS technologies, such as oxy-fuel combustion, chemical
absorption or oxygen-blown pressurised combustion or
gasification of coal.
The Kyoto Protocol (1997) fixed a global greenhouse gas
emission reduction of about 5% compared to the emission level
of 1990 and to be accomplished within the years 2008-2012.
Moreover, in 2003 the European Parliament and Council
approved the 2003/87/EC directive, starting the creation of a
regulation framework for carbon emissions trading and aimed
to establish a carbon market in Europe. Presently, the European
Union Emission Trading Scheme (EU-ETS) is the largest
greenhouse gas emissions trading scheme in the world
(Ellerman and Buchner, 2007), with emission allowances
established and assigned to above 10,000 European companies,

1 Copyright © 2008 by ASME

which cover over 45% of the overall CO2 emissions in Europe.
Current estimates for the cost of CO2 capture suggest to keep
the target value for the price of the additional allowance for
CO2 above 20 €/ton (Strömberg, 2003).
Enel, which is the Italy's largest electricity producer and
established in 21 countries across Europe, North and Latin
America, confirmed its commitment in development and
application of CCS Technologies. Since 2006, a program of
regular investments has been launched, oriented to the
environment through innovation and particularly addressed
towards renewable energy sources, zero emission power plants
and efficiency improvements.
Enel already applies the best available technologies
devoted to control pollutants such as sulphur, nitrogen oxides
and fly-ash. However, it still remains continued pressure to
reduce emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2). Accordingly, Enel
started two projects aiming to test at industrial scale post-
combustion and oxy-coal combustion capture technologies.
Their objective is to build by 2010 two pilot-scale plants based
on ammine scrubbing and oxy-coal combustion, respectively,
and aiming to test CO2 capture technologies for future zero
emission power plants.
This paper focuses on the process design and energy
analysis of a Rankine cycle viable for future coal-fired power
plants based on a pressurised oxy-coal combustion technology
and including CO2 capture. Cycle selection has been made by
privileging feasibility and reliability. No cycle-configurations
pursuing maximum efficiency are presented and they will be
the focus of further publications.
Pressurised oxy-coal combustion technology
Over the whole past year, Enel tested on a 5 MWth scale a
patented pressurised coal combustion process named
ISOTHERM® (Malavasi and Rosetti, 2005; Malavasi and
Rosetti 2007), where the combustion and the heat transfer
processes occur in separated equipments (Fig. 1), working at
the same pressure level. Such a process performs a pressurised
combustion of coal in an atmosphere of oxygen, carbon dioxide
and water. The developed combustion process allows
producing ash-less hot gases, which can be properly used in
Rankine cycle providing a pressurized and concentrated CO2
stream for storage.
Enel’s experimental efforts started on 2006 (Benelli et al.,
2007), together with Itea, which is the patent owner that
developed the first experimental plant on 1998 and the 5 MWth
demonstration plant on 2003. the experimental facilities are
based in Gioia del Colle (southern Italy).
By performing combustion at pressure levels higher than
atmospheric it becomes possible to increase the burning rate of
char and the heat transfer rate. The increased burning rate
allows keeping low the molar fraction of residual oxygen at the
combustor outlet. The increased heat transfer rate leads to a
reduced requirement of heat transfer surfaces, when the heat
transfer is performed by a convective boiler.
The process described above has been tested within a
refractory lined combustor working at 4 bar(a). Coal is milled
up to particle sizes higher than those adopted in conventional
boilers and it is fed to the combustor as Coal Water Slurry
(CWS). Cryogenic oxygen is adopted as oxidant and the
combustion temperature is controlled by recycling a portion of
the flue gas at the boiler outlet. Process temperature has to be
kept above 1550°C. The flue gas recycled to the combustor is
mixed with oxygen before entering the combustor, while a
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second recycle is established to control the temperature at the
boiler entrance, where temperature is kept close to 800°C by a
tempering section.
Such a process removes coal ashes as vitrified inert
materials. This is possible because the combustion feature
allows keeping almost constant the temperature profile over the
whole combustor length at temperatures higher than those
required by the flow point of molten slag.
The main features of such a combustion process are:
• high gas emissivity and heat capacity of the recycled
flue gas, according to the presence of tri-atomic
molecules (water and carbon dioxide);
• high density of the gas phase inside the combustor,
according to the pressurized conditions and the higher
molar weight of CO2 compared to N2;
• high ash removal efficiency;
• constant temperature profile over the whole length of
the combustor;
• capability to burn low grade coals, usually not allowed
in pulverised coal boilers, where severe slagging
phenomena may occur;
• oxy-coal combustion results in a compressed CO2
stream with purity levels easily higher than 93% and
with low content of inert gases. The pressure level of
the CO2 stream is close to the pressure of the
combustion process.
According to promising results achieved from the
experimental activities of 2007, Enel is going to conduct
additional experimental tests during 2008 (Benelli et al., 2008).
Fig. 1 – Flow diagram of the Isotherm® Process
2 Copyright © 2008 by ASME

Fig. 2 – 3D view of the 48 MWth pilot plant based on pressurized oxy-coal combustion
“Innovative Combustion” project: 48 MWth pilot plant
Enel planned by 2010 the construction of a 48 MWth pilot
plant, based on a pressurized oxy-fuel combustion process,
designed for removing ashes as molten slag and achieving high
ash removal efficiencies. Starting from 2006, Enel has teamed
with Enea and the combustion-patent owner to conduct
comprehensive studies on pressurised oxy-coal combustion,
including experiments at a 5 MWth scale.
The design and construction of the 48 MWth pilot plant is
the necessary step to scale-up from the 5 MWth size to a full-
scale commercial plant, including CO2 recovery. The executive
design of the pilot plant is now under development. The pilot
plant will be built in Enel’s Federico II Coal Power Station (4 x
660 MWel), based in Brindisi (Italy). According to project
schedule, the construction activities will start during 2009,
while the first combustion test is scheduled at the end of 2010.
Additional details on pressurised oxy-coal combustion project
and on the time scheduling for 48-MWth pilot plant
construction are reported by Benelli et al. (2008).
The basic design of the 48 MWth pilot plant is already
completed. Fig. 2 shows a 3D-view of the pilot plant, drawn
according to the basic design. As can be seen, large areas have
been left free, so as to allow including additional experimental
facilities in the future, such as oxygen production plants based
on solid state diffusion membranes, as well as dehydration and
purification processes.
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This paper is focused on the process design and energy
analysis for a large scale (320 MWel) coal-fired power plant
based on pressurised oxy-fuel combustion and including CO2
capture.
The adopted methodology, the cycle configuration and
results are presented and widely discussed in the following
sections. The cycle selection has been performed privileging
feasibility and reliability. No maximum efficiency cycle-
configurations are presented. They will be the focus of further
publications.
METHODOLOGY
Energy conversion process has been simulated with a
commercial tool (Thermoflow, 2007), evaluating all process
quantities and the most important performance parameters.
Process simulation has been performed with reference to
the following assumptions: (i) ambient reference conditions are
those fixed by the International Organization for
Standardization (ISO): 288 K, 1 atm, 60% of relative humidity;
(ii) water/steam properties are those reported by IAPWS IF-97
formulations published by the International Association for the
Properties of Water and Steam (IAPWS); (iii) thermo-physical
gas properties are those reported by NIST/JANAF gas tables.
(iv) duct pressure losses are all neglected; (v) pressure losses
through plant components are taken into account and properly
fixed at levels complying with the current technological level
3 Copyright © 2008 by ASME
of commercial equipments. After having evaluated the main
process quantities and performance parameters, a sensitivity
analysis has been conducted.
CYCLE CONFIGURATION
Many cycles have been suggested for CO2 capture based
on oxy-fuel combustion (Ishikawa and Umoto, 1995; Jericha
and Fesharaki, 1995; Iantovski and Mathieu, 1996; Anderson et
al., 1998.; Sundkvist et al., 2001). Among others, the Matiant
cycle is particularly attractive, because of its potential to
achieve high efficiency levels with CO2 recovery. The Matiant
cycle is a recuperative Brayton-like cycle, where the working
fluid is a mixture of CO2 and H2O. Matiant cycle takes
advantage of multiple reheats and inter-cooled compression,
but the main advantage arising is that CO2 is provided at high
pressure and low temperature, which is the more desired
condition for recovery and sequestration.
Even though cycles like the Water cycle, the Matiant cycle
or the Graz cycle are promising, they introduce several
technological challenges and are mainly devoted to gaseous
fuels. Their application to coal combustion is fairly difficult
and would introduce additional challenges, primarily due to the
high sulfur content of fuel.
According to above, the following criteria have been
established as reference for cycle selection:
1. the selected thermal cycle should achieve
reliability and feasibility levels that allow for its
commercial application;
2. the selected thermal cycle should allow capturing
CO2 while limiting at the same time the
corresponding energy penalties.
The Rankine cycle fully complies with the cycle selection
criteria introduced above and it is the most promising in terms
of operating reliability and feasibility. As a result, it has been
selected as the most suitable cycle to be integrated with the
selected pressurized oxy-coal combustion process.
The selection of a well-consolidated cycle also helps
achieving the required plant flexibility for industrial
applications, which includes: (i) the capability to perform load
variations of ±3% within a time interval of 30 seconds (primary
regulation); (ii) the capability to perform load ramps of ±6%
within a time interval of 1.5 minutes (secondary regulation);
(iii) the capability to face conditions typical of a load rejection.
Cycle parameters are briefly reported in Table 1. In order
to optimize thermal integration of plant sections and streams,
all Low Pressure (LP) steam bleedings have been removed and
substituted by large heat recovery from flue gases. This allows
exploiting the water dew-point increase due to flue gas
condensation occurring in pressure. In addition, the availability
of a low temperature source provided by condensed water
strongly improves heat recovery, which comes within reach of
14% of fuel power input.
Such a practice makes it mandatory to: (i) increase
deaerator pressure level, so as to recover heat from the flue gas
over the LP regenerative path; (ii) face the increased acid dew
point of pressurised flue gases. Additional details about the
process design are described in the following.
Process flow diagram
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The process flow diagram and thermodynamic
transformations of the cycle are as reported in Fig. 3. Sections
on the water side have been properly numbered as follows:
1 – exit of water-cooled condenser
2 – exit of condensed water extraction pump
3 – exit of makeup/blow-down of stream water
4 – exit of flue gas condenser (water side)
5 – exit of cooling circuit of the refractory lined combustor
6 – exit of deaerator
7 – exit of feedwater pump
8 – exit of the first surface FeedWater Heater (FWH)
9 – exit of the second surface FeedWater Heater (FWH)
10 – exit of Economizer (ECO)
11 – exit of Once Through Boiler (OTB)
12 – exit of SuperHeater (SH)
13 – exit of SuperCritical steam turbine (SC)
14 – exit of First ReHeater (1st hot reheat – RH1)
15 – exit of High Pressure steam turbine (HP) first section
16 – exit of High Pressure steam turbine (HP) casing
17 – exit of Second ReHeater (2nd hot reheat – RH2)
18 – exit of Intermediate Pressure (IP) casing
19 – exit of Low Pressure (LP) casing
Since the combustor is a refractory lined cylinder, with an
external metal shield fluxed by water, the heat losses from the
combustor can be easily recovered by adopting condensed
water as cooling medium. The early mentioned heat recovery is
performed between sections 4 and 5, and it is not explicitly
showed in the flow diagram.
As can be seen, all LP bleedings are cancelled, regardless
of what is usually made in a traditional Rankine cycle
configuration, where at least one or two bleedings are
performed from the LP steam assembly. The heat required by
feeding water to approach deaerator temperature is provided by
recovering heat from the flue gas path. Since the water molar
fraction in the flue gas is quite high, the amount of latent heat
to be recovered is correspondingly large.
4 Copyright © 2008 by ASME
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Fig. 3 – Process flow diagram of the proposed Rankine cycle with large heat recovery from flue gases. N2 molar fractions
include also Argon. On the h-s plane is reported the thermal cycle only (referred to the working fluid).

However, due to the high pressure of flue gases (10 bar), Flue gases exit the combustor with the following
the amount of latent heat recoverable by using condensed water composition: O2=2.5%, H2O=48.3%, CO2=47.57%, N2=1.5%,
(about 32°C) as low temperature source is higher than that SO2=0.13% (reported value refers to an oxygen purity of 98%).
allowed in atmospheric systems. The total amount of heat, After having condensed the flue gas by means of surface heat
recovered between sections 2/3 and 4/5 (Fig. 3) is far above exchangers, the composition becomes: O2=4.7%, H2O=1.67%,
13% of the net thermal power associated to the fuel input. The CO2=90.5%, N2=2.9%, SO2=0.23%. This is the composition of
line between points 1-4 reported in h-s plane of Fig. 3 flue gases entering the CO2 Compression and Purification Unit
represents the feedwater heating along the LP regenerative (CPU). Such a composition is really favourable, according to
path. All the heat transferred to feedwater between sections 1-5 the low inert content and the CO2 mole fraction that overcomes
is recovered from the flue gas and combustor heat loss. the 90% frontier before entering the CPU.
Deaerator pressure level is set to 9 bar, so as to recover
over the LP regenerative path as much heat as possible from the Table 1 – Parameters of the selected Rankine-cycle
flue gas. The high deaerator pressure level allows increasing Number of reheat Double reheat
the temperature of feed-water entering deaerator and, in that
order, reducing terminal temperature difference at the hot-side SH outlet temperature 605°C
of the recovery heat-exchanger. SH outlet pressure 250 bar
The combustor is pressurised at 10 bar and coal is fed as 1st RH outlet temperature 605°C
water slurry. The combustion process requires to recycle the st
flue gas from the boiler outlet. Recycled flue gases sent to the 1 RH outlet pressure 56 bar
nd
combustor allow mitigating the combustion temperature, while 2 RH outlet temperature 620°C
recycled flue gases sent to the boiler inlet perform a tempering nd
2 RH outlet pressure 18.14 bar
of hot gases. Such a practice helps to prevent ashes from
bringing about undesirable slagging phenomena along pipes Condenser pressure 0.05 bar
and components downstream the combustor. It also helps to Number of regenerative heat 3 (1 deaerator and 2 surface
reduce alkali condensation, with a corresponding reduction of exchangers heat exchangers)
fouling problems. More details on the combustor section and Deaerator pressure 9 bar
process are reported by Benelli et al. (2007; 2008).

5 Copyright © 2008 by ASME

CYCLE PERFORMANCE Table 2 – Plant performance summary
Cycle performance reported in Table 2 refers to the Gross cycle performance Base case CO2 capture case
following boundary conditions: (i) ISO ambient temperature, Net fuel input (kW) 903290 903290
pressure and relative humidity; (ii) the combustor is a Gross Power (kW) 429615 429615
pressurised slag combustor with high ash-removal efficiency Gross efficiency (%) 47.56 47.56
(98%); (iii) combustor heat loss are 2%; (iv) combustor
pressure is 10 bar; (v) combustor pressure drop is 1%; (vi) Plant auxiliaries
combustor outlet flue-gas minimum oxygen mole fraction is ASU power cons. (kW) 74192 74192
2.5%; (vii) convective boiler inlet temperature is 820°C; (viii) CPU power cons. (kW) 0 17347

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boiler outlet temperature is 270°C; (ix) oxygen purity is 98%; Other plant auxiliaries (kW) 17980 17980
(x) oxygen production cost is 0.275 kWh/kg. Reference coal Total auxiliaries (kW) 92172 109519
adopted for the process simulation is reported in Table 3.
Net cycle performance
Net Power (kW) 337443 320096
SENSITIVITY ANALYSIS
Net Heat rate (kJ/kWh) 9637 10158
Several process parameters may have great influence on
Net efficiency (%) 37.36 35.44
net electric efficiency and final production costs. A
comprehensive list contains the following quantities: Accordingly, an air separation unit (ASU) always requires
mechanical work for inlet air compression and may require
1. Combustion Combustion process pressure additional mechanical work if oxygen is requested at pressures
process Combustor outlet temperature higher the those typical at the outlet of distillation process.
Combustor heat loss A process simulation of the standard ASU process has been
Slurry water content conducted and energy penalties for cryogenic oxygen
Fraction of steam injected production were as follows:
Oxygen content at outlet • GOX @ 1 bar:: 0.23 kWh/kg (case (i))
Oxygen purity at inlet
• GOX @ 2.5 bar: 0.25 kWh/kg (case (ii))
2. Steam cycle Main steam temperature • GOX @ 12 bar: 0.29 kWh/kg (case (iii))
Main steam pressure
• LOX: 0.5 kWh/kg (case (iii))
Steam temperatures at reheats
Deaerator pressure Distillation column is typically designed to work close to 5
Condenser pressure bar or 10 bar. The design at 5 bar is the cheaper one, because of
the lower mechanical work required for the compression of
3. Flue gas line Boiler inlet temperature inlet air. The evaluated penalties refers to an ASU working at 5
ECO Pinch point bar as process pressure.
Fig. 4 shows the efficiency curve depending of the oxygen
4. Coal Ash content production cost.
composition Water content
Among the above quantities, the following have been
selected for the analysis because they play a key role in overall
cycle performance: (i) pressure of the combustion process, (ii)
oxygen purity, (iii) oxygen mole fraction at the combustor
outlet and (iv) coal ash content. In addition, the cost of coal and
energy cost of oxygen production have been also taken into
account. The sensitivity analysis conducted on the selected
quantities is reported in the following.

Energy penalties associated to oxygen production

Oxygen can be produced as Liquid OXygen (LOX) or
Gaseous OXygen (GOX). GOX can be delivered: (i) at
atmospheric pressure (by expanding the oxygen exiting the
distillation column), (ii) close to the distillation column Fig. 4 – Impact of the oxygen production cost on the net
pressure (without further compression), (iii) at higher pressures electric efficiency (the reference work requirement for
than distillation column outlet pressure (by providing further producing GOX @ 10bar is 0.275kWh/kg). The dot line
compression of oxygen). refers to production cost too low to be considered

6 Copyright © 2008 by ASME

Benefits arising from burning cheap coals
An enhanced capability to burn cheap coals may arise from
adopting combustion systems where the combustion process
and the heat transfer process occur in separated equipments,
where coal ashes are removed as vitrified inert materials and
where high pressure of combustion process increases the
burning rate of char. These conditions allow burning coals with
high ash content, even if the ash melting point is low, as well as
coals with a poor content of volatile matter. Such coals are

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usually better priced in the market according to their difficult to
be burnt in conventional atmospheric boilers.
In order to evaluate benefits arising from burning cheap
coals, a reference coal has been adopted and compared to
cheaper coals. For the evaluation two coals have been selected:
a high-volatile C bituminous coal with ash content above 30% Fig. 5 – Benefit arising from burning COAL A
(COAL A) and an high-volatile A bituminous coal with ash
fluid temperature at 1250°C, evaluated in oxidant atmosphere
(COAL B).
According to comparison purposes, an index has been
properly established and named Equivalent Net Efficiency,
defined as the efficiency that the plant burning the reference
coal (at the reference cost) should have to reach the same cost
of electricity that is achieved by burning the cheaper coal
(available at a reduced cost).
Results are summarised by Fig. 5 and Fig. 6. Lines
resulting from such an analysis could be considered as “iso-
Cost Of Electricity (iso-COE)” curves. According to energy
penalties due to some coal characteristics (e.g. high ash-
content), curves at x=100% start below the efficiency of the
reference case (dot lines in figures).
Table 3 – Properties of coals adopted for comparison Fig. 6 – Benefit arising from burning COAL B
purposes
COAL A COAL B
REFERENCE Impact of process pressure on overall requirement of
COAL High-volatile High-volatile
C bituminous A bituminous compression work
According to the combustion technology chosen, the
Total pressure of the combustion process also defines the pressure of
6.4% 3.1% 14.63%
moist. the whole gas line. Therefore, this pressure sets also the
pressure level of the acid condensers, where an high pressure
Ash 7% 30.36% 2.55%
level helps to increase the dew point where the condensation
Carbon 71.1% 54.27% 71.87% starts and it also allows avoiding additional compression work
in the CPU.
Hydrogen 4.7% 3.79% 5.27%
The process pressure level has large impact on mechanical
Nitrogen 1.2% 1.25% 1% work required for both oxygen and carbon dioxide
compression. Oxygen produced by the ASU needs to be
Sulfur 0.5% 0.97% 0.11%
compressed up to the pressure of the combustor. Thus an
Oxygen 9.1% 6.26% 4.57% increase of the process pressure leads to an increase of the
compression work. On the other hand, an increase of process
LHV 27971 kJ/kg 21870 kJ/kg 27025 kJ/kg
pressure reduces the compression work of CO2, which requires
Ash fluid to be compressed from the process pressure up to the pressure
1400°C 1350°C 1200°C
point for its pipeline transportation (110 bar).
Note: Ash fluid point is referred to reducing atmosphere. Proximate analysis is The availability of pressurised flue gases dramatically
on “as received basis”. Coal-properties that may make these coals cheaper are decreases the compression work for the CO2. If the flue gas is
reported in bold type. at 10 bar the pressure ratio of the CO2 compression decreases

7 Copyright © 2008 by ASME

by an order of magnitude and the corresponding compression
work becomes roughly a half of that required by starting the
compression from 1 bar.
The compression work depends on the machine quality
(i.e. polytropic efficiency) and the temperature where the
compression starts. In addition, it also depends on the pressure
ratio and the properties of the compressed gas (i.e. gas constant
and specific heat evaluated at constant pressure or volume). As
a result, if the polytropic efficiency, the pressure ratio and the
inlet temperature are fixed, the specific compression work
depends on the gas properties only. In general terms, the
specific compression work increases if the gas constant is high
and the ratio γ of specific heats (cp/cv) is low. Since the carbon
dioxide has a lower gas constant (188.9 J/(kg⋅K)) than that of
oxygen (259.8 J/(kg⋅K)) and it has also an higher ratio γ (1.28)
than the oxygen one (1.4), specific compression work of carbon
dioxide is significantly lower than specific compression work
of oxygen.
Other parameters to be considered are the mass flow rates
associated to the streams of carbon dioxide and oxygen to be
compressed. It could be easily shown that these mass flow rates
are quite close.
The mass flow of the flue gas strongly depends on the
carbon content of coal. The water content has a lower influence
on the compression work, because it can be easily kept below
2% by adopting surface heat exchangers cooled by a thermal
source at ambient temperature. As the combustion is performed
with almost pure oxygen, also the inert content is negligible for
the purpose of evaluating the compression work requirement.
The mass flow mCO2 of CO2 can be expressed in terms of
the fuel mass flow mF and the carbon content wC% of coal (as
received, mass basis):
44
mCO 2 = ⋅ m& F ⋅ wC % (1)
12
The mass flow mO2 of O2 can be expressed in terms of the
equivalent ratio φ, the stoichiometric ratio αst and the fuel mass
flow mF:
mO 2 = ϕ ⋅ α st ⋅ m& F (2)
By combining Eq. (1) and Eq. (2) it can be obtained the ratio
between mass flow rates of oxygen and carbon dioxide:
mCO 2 44 12 ⋅ wC %
= (3)
mO 2 ϕ ⋅ α st
According to Eq. (3), the ratio between mass flow rates of
carbon dioxide and oxygen is slightly above the unit. As
example, if the carbon mass content wC% is equal to 70% (as
received basis) and stoichiometric ratio is assumed equal to
2.15, with an equivalence ratio equal to 1.037, the mass flow
rate of carbon dioxide is 1.12 times higher than mass flow rate
of oxygen.
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Fig. 7 – Impact of process pressure on the overall
compression work for O2 and CO2 compression. Quantities
are normalized by the corresponding compression work at 5
bar, where the work ratio is equal to 1.
As a result, carbon dioxide mass flow rate is slightly
higher than that of oxygen, if coals of common use are
considered. Nevertheless, it has been shown that the carbon
dioxide is easier to be compressed compared to oxygen. The
balance of these two effects is summarised by Fig. 7, which
refers to the reference coal (Table 3). As can been seen, the
process pressure level has almost no influence on the overall
compression work.
Impact of process pressure on heat-transfer surface
requirement
Heat transfer coefficient can be evaluated starting from
empirical correlations such as the following:
Nu = C ⋅ Re n ⋅ Pr m ⋅ χ (4)
n and m being empirical parameters typically bounded in the
range 0.5-0.9 and 0.3-0.5, respectively; Nu, Re and Pr being
the Nusselt, Reynolds and Prandtl numbers; C being a properly
fixed constant and χ being a ratio between geometrical or
thermo-physical quantities, which can be sometimes introduced
to manage specific heat-transfer schemes.
For most cases, simplified formulations including constant
C, Re and Pr numbers only, are adequate enough to evaluate
heat transfer coefficients on the gas side. One of the most
common formulation has been proposed by Grimson (1937)
and after modified by other authors:
Nu = 0.287 f a ⋅ f b ⋅ Re 0.61 ⋅ Pr 0.33 (5)
fa and fb being parameters taking geometries and architectures
of tube banks into account. By adopting Eq. (5), the gas side
heat transfer coefficient UG can be expressed as follows:
U G = 0.287 f a ⋅ f b ⋅ Re 0.61 ⋅ Pr 0.33 ⋅ λ D (6)
λ being thermal conductivity and D external tube diameter.
8 Copyright © 2008 by ASME
Table 4 – Comparison of heat transfer coefficients for a process, with a large benefit on the energy penalties associated
superheater bank of a convective heat exchanger at to the purification system. Such advantage is mainly due to two
atmospheric pressure and at 10 bar factors: air infiltration typical of conventional atmospheric
boilers are completely avoided and the char burning rate
1 bar 10 bar increases with pressure, making low molar fraction of oxygen
at the combustor outlet possible. As a result, the inert content is
pressure bar 1 10 easily kept below the 7% and it could be further reduced. In
bulk temperature °C 689.25 689.25 addition, by keeping low the amount of residual oxygen at the
fa - 1.07 1.07 combustor outlet allows reducing oxygen wasted and the

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fd - 0.99 0.97 correspondent energy penalties of oxygen production.
density kg/m3 0.36 3.64 The enhanced capability to burn cheap coals, traditionally
not allowed in conventional atmospheric boilers, may lead to
velocity m/s 15.3 15.3
huge benefits in terms of electricity production costs. It has
tube external diameter m 0.0785 0.0785 been shown (Fig. 5 and Fig. 6) that 1% reduction on fuel costs
viscosity g/m s 0.0397 0.0397 is equivalent in terms of COE reduction to an increase of about
Re - 11041 110415 0.5% in net plant efficiency.
thermal conductivity W/(m K) 0.088 0.088 Since the combustor operates at 10 bar, high pressure of
UG W/(m2 K) 98 392 flue gases leads to a relevant increase in both acid and water
NOTE: Layout of the whole heat-transfer path is that reported in Fig. 3. Flue dew points. The increase in acid dew point makes it complex to
gas inlet temperature of the pressurised convective boiler is about 800°C. The perform flue gas condensation and pushes for the adoption of
boiler works at 10 bar and the evaluation of heat transfer coefficient at 1 bar is dedicated acid condensers; the increase in water dew point
for comparison purpose only.
makes it possible to regenerate latent heat at higher
temperatures than those typically allowed by flue gases at
Few considerations about Eq. (6) should be addressed in
atmospheric pressure.
order to recognize the quantities mainly influencing the heat
According to high water content in flue gases, the latent
transfer coefficient. Pr number is slightly dependent on gas
and sensible heat recoverable by low temperature thermal
bulk temperature and its influence on heat transfer coefficient is
sources (32÷160°C) is quite high (>13% of fuel power input).
fairly negligible. Re mainly depends on gas velocity through
Such a condition makes it mandatory to recover heat from flue
the tube bank, as well as on gas bulk temperature and pressure.
gases in order to preserve high efficiency levels.
Since the density depends linearly on pressure, an increase in
Even as process pressure has a huge impact on heat
gas pressure leads to a corresponding increase in gas density. If
recovery from the flue gas, it has shown a small effect on the
the flue gas velocity is fixed and kept constant by reducing the
overall compression work associated to oxygen compression
flow passage area according to the pressure increase, Re
and CO2 compression (Fig. 7).
depends only on pressure.
Due to the higher density of flue gases, heat transfer
Such an effect can be shown if the gas pressure rises from
coefficients in the pressurised (10 bar) convective boiler are
atmospheric to 10 bar, where the value given by Eq. (6)
expected one order of magnitude higher than those of
increase by about a factor 4 (i.e.: 100.61). Since the overall heat
convective sections of conventional boilers. As a result, lower
transfer coefficient U is really close to the gas-side heat-
extensions of convective heat-transfer surfaces are needed
transfer coefficient UG, such an increase leads also to a
compared to those required by atmospheric equipments. Since
corresponding increase in the overall heat-transfer rate and the
such an occurrence could lead to large economic benefit,
heat-transfer surface requirement can be also reduced in that
further investigations will be essential, focusing on boiler
order.
sections made of high grade alloys.
Just for comparison purposes, heat transfer coefficients
Such advantages, along with the potential for CO2 capture,
have been evaluated both at atmospheric pressure and at 10 bar,
suggested to continue the research activities on the 5 MWth
with reference to the super-heater bank of a counter-current
facility based in Gioia del Colle (Italy) and move to design the
convective heat exchanger. Table 4 shows results arising from
48 MWth scale pilot plant, to be built by 2010 in the area of the
this analysis. As can be seen, the heat transfer rate rises from
Enel’s Brindisi Power Plant.
98W/(m K) to 392 W/(m K).
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
CONCLUDING REMARKS
Authors wish to thank Elio Morgani (Enel Produzione
The adoption of pressurised oxy-fuel combustion systems
S.p.A., Sviluppo e Realizzazione Impianti, Roma) for
for CO2 capture leads to better performance compared to
providing this work with basic design data needed to draw the
several atmospheric solutions. Above all, it becomes possible to
3D-view of the 48 MWth pilot plant.
achieve really high levels of CO2 purity after the combustion

9 Copyright © 2008 by ASME

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