A Comparative Study on the Performance Augmentation of a Gas Turbine Power Plant

Abstract

In the present work, a comparative performance analysis of the gas turbine power plant with and without power augmenting devices was carried out. The intercooler, turbine burner (reheater), and heat exchanger were inserted individually and together to reveal the effect of each device. A model for each addition was derived on the base of the simple cycle and adapted to reflect the effect of the performance parameters on the plant power and thermal efficiency. The heat exchanger with different effectiveness improves the thermal efficiency but for low pressure ratios, while the intercooler has low effect at low pressure ratios. Its effect increases with increasing of this ratio and this needs advanced materials. The intercooler cooling percent was considered as 50%, 75% and 100%. The use of turbine burner alone augments the output power by 19.4% but on the expense of thermal efficiency (dropped by 4%) and fuel price. The interstage compressor cooling augments the power by 1.3%, while the efficiency increases slowly and needs a large amount of compression. The combination of intercooling with turbine burner enhances the power by 13.4%. So the regeneration must be installed with them to ensure an enhancement in plant compatibility and thermal efficiency.