CCUG

It happens to all of us. One day we wake up and realize, we’re not young anymore. You can, in the same breath, decide you need to do some things differently. Or, you can ignore it, and pay a larger price later. The same thing is true with heat-recovery steam generators (HRSGs). Combined-cycle plants experienced […]

Ever stop to think about what’s going on with your HRSG’s steam drums, out of sight for the most part and all wrapped up in insulation? Even if you were to hike up to the drum level what could you see? Next question: How many people at your plant really think about the boiler? Their

It’s easy to forget about the “big box” selective catalytic reduction (SCR) unit sandwiched in your HRSG modules, even though it stands between you and compliance with your air permit, and your ability to operate. At the 2017 conference of the Combined Cycle Users Group (CCUG), held in Phoenix the last week of August, Andy

Special to CCJ ONSite by Brian Hulse, BDHulse Consulting Services LLC “We have met the enemy and he is us.” Walt Kelly wrote those words for Pogo to speak in his comic strip, marking the first annual observance of Earth Day back in April 1970. He was making the observation that pollution of the planet

Special to CCJ ONSite by Brian Hulse, BDHulse Consulting Services LLC Seems like a simple enough question. It gets asked thousands of times a day in restaurants around the world. But in generating plants powered by gas turbines, it takes on a whole different meaning. These engines are very sensitive to salt, and there are

Special to CCJ ONSite by Brian Hulse, BDHulse Consulting Services LLC If we know one thing about hoses, it’s that they’re expensive. So we always try to extract maximum value from them before they’re replaced. The hoses used on most gas turbines are manufactured with no published shelf-life or working-life limitation. Each hose on the

Building the better mouse trap Special to CCJ ONsite by Brian Hulse, BDHulse Consulting Services LLC It’s an age-old quest—building the better mouse trap. The US Patent Office has issued over 4400 patents for mouse traps although, paradoxically, only about 20 of them have ever seen any commercial success. This would lead one to think

Special to CCJ ONSite by Brian Hulse, BDHulse Consulting Services LLC At some point in time, everyone who is anyone, from Arnold Palmer (photo) to Mahatma Gandhi, has made a quotable statement regarding cleanliness and/or hygiene. It’s never a controversial topic. Back in the 1840s, a Hungarian physician named Ignaz Semmelweis (1818-1865) demonstrated scientifically that

Special to CCJ ONSite by Brian Hulse, BDHulse Consulting Services LLC The actor Samuel L Jackson’s intimidating line in a credit-card commercial (“So, what’s in your wallet?”) came to mind the other day while I was reading an excellent blog written by Kelly Forrest for Cleveland-based Brennan industries, entitled “What You Don’t Know About O-Ring

Brian Hulse is a leading information resource for gas-turbine owner/operators and CCJ ONsite. He has spent his 40+ post-college years dealing with gas turbines from many perspectives—including US Navy, EPC, O&M (owner and third party), asset management, component repair/reverse engineering/manufacture, mobile powerplant packaging, and depot MRO management. Hulse’s deep technical experience—aero engines such as the