As severe weather events grow make sure your ACC keeps up Whether you call it “weather” or “climate,” severe weather events are increasing in both number and severity, which means hot and cold days may be more intense and more frequent, regions surrounding your plant may be ravaged by fires and smoke, and ice and […]

The Combined Cycle Users Group (CCUG) opened Day One of its 2021 virtual conference with a roundtable discussion on confined-space safety. Arguably, it’s a topic perhaps even more essential to onsite staff as other responsibilities shift to offsite personnel, contractors, and OEM reps. The discussion was facilitated by Steve Hilger, plant manager at Dogwood Energy

An international user writes via the forum, We have a horizontal dual-pressure HRSG (Alstom India) with bypass stack and diverter damper. A recent inspection of the HP section found that some tubes and face plates were “sagging” (photos). Those tubes are misaligned because of this. The same observation was made during the previous inspection, with

Calling it “safer, faster, and deeper” than dry-ice blasting, Jeff Bause, CEO, Groome Industrial Service Group, introduced participants in the 2021 virtual conference of the Combined Cycle Users Group to KinetiClean HRSG tube cleaning, a patented kinetic shockwave technique widely used in other industries but new to combined cycles. It was developed by Explosive Professionals

Boiler tube leaks have been plaguing fossil-fired powerplants for decades. HRSGs, especially those which cycle frequently, are no exception. Plants experiencing recurring tube leaks should analyze for root cause and make the necessary modifications. If that’s too expensive, another option is to install a sophisticated acoustic monitoring system (AMS) to at least detect leaks earlier,

Twenty years ago, few people probably thought that a tube cleaning technique for HRSGs attached to gas-fired turbines would be adapted from those used for solid-fuel boilers. Yet that’s where we are today. Carl Wise, Thompson Industrial Services, and Vince Barreto, PowerPlus Cleaning Systems, showed attendees at the HRSG Forum Supplier Workshop, Oct 7, 2021,

Emerson Power & Water Solutions held its 2021 Ovation Users Group conference virtually, focusing on current industry and business trends, projects, and services. Robert Yeager, president of Power & Water Solutions, and Al Eliasen, president of Emerson’s OSI Digital Grid Solutions, highlighted how the 2020 acquisition of Open Systems International Inc helps the company meet

Average length of service of the contractor’s employees and the skill levels of the various tradespeople are important qualification metrics, advises Bill Kitterman, GM, Bremco Inc, a recent addition to the SVI family of companies. He recommends that you ask for and carefully review resumes. Contractors worth considering for your work should have them ready

Siemens Energy Day during the virtual 2021 Combined Cycle Users Group (CCUG) conference gave users plenty to think about to keep their plants “relevant” as renewables continue to claim a larger share of generating capacity. Presentations covered the more immediate options for upgrading, optimizing, weatherizing, and cyber-securing your plant, but also longer-term options like adding

Imagine putting your turbine back together after an outage only to find that you’ve lost 8 MW because the clearances were grossly out of spec. Or adding three days to the outage because someone didn’t check the capacity of the bearing repair shop. Or losing time because the lifting and laydown plan that worked flawlessly