Advanced ceramics for land-based gas turbine applications. Final report

In order to increase the efficiency of land-based gas turbines, inlet gas temperatures have to be increased, and the amount of air which cools the turbine vanes has to be reduced, to the maximum extent possible. Presently, thermal barrier coatings (TBC`s) are the state of the art in achieving these goals. However, since TBC`s are very thin (typically 100 {mu}m), they have clearly limitations. Since all-ceramic turbine vanes would be a very large and risky development step, Westinghouse is considering to protect the leading edges of turbine vanes with high-performance ceramics. This might be done by either replacing the leading edge with a suitably shaped ceramic part, or by modifying the vanes such that they can accommodate ceramic inserts. Among the most important criteria for the success of ceramics in such applications are (a) thermodynamic compatibility with the turbine vane alloy, (b) sufficient thermal shock resistance to survive the thermal cycling during operation and in particular during emergency shut-down, and a design considering the thermal expansion mismatch of the metallic and ceramic components. This paper presents results of work performed on SiC, SiN, and aluminas