Performance Comparisons on Post Combustion Flue Gas Control Systems in Locally Available Power Plants

In this study, author attempted to analyze and compare the performance of different flue gas emission control systems of selected thermal power plants in terms of standard flue gas monitoring data and proposed emission standards of stationary sources combustion systems introduced by the Central Environmental Authority (CEA) of Sri Lanka. This study, however, does not discuss any design specifications or theoretical phenomena of the selected system and focused on to present the data in more practical way. Sixty five sets of data obtained during the last 4 years (including 2017) from 3 numbers of fossil fuel fired and 5 numbers of bio fuel fired power plants were considered. Thus the numbers of data sets per plant are not equal and depend on those monitoring requirements such as annual, bi annual or quarterly and plant commissioning period. Hence some plants are having more than 10 times repeated data sets and some are having only the limited number of data sets. Data monitoring were based on the United State Environmental Protection Agency [USEPA] approved test methods. Electro Static Precipitators [ESP], Bag Filters [BF], Cyclone Separators [CS] and Wet Scrubbers [WS] are the different flue gas emission control systems incorporated in the selected bio fuel fired power plants. None of the selected fossil fuel fired power plants are incorporated in such devices for flue gas emission control system. The outcomes of this study will therefore be important and useful to compare the performance of different flue gas emission control system with respect to the type of fuel, way of combustion, types of plant and the capacity of plant etc. In addition, those information might be useful when implementing the proposed emission standard for power plants in terms of reference oxygen levels and emission limits. Finally the author tries to convince the best suitable flue gas emission control method/methods for stationary combustion systems in future development ; not only the power plants, but also the other industrial combustion systems, such as steam boilers, furnaces, kilns etc. can be modified with the suitable flue gas cleaning system.