TY - JOUR
TI - Improvement of environmental aspects of thermal power plant operation by advanced control concepts
AU - Mikulandrić Robert
AU - Lončar Dražen
AU - Cvetinović Dejan B
AU - Spiridon Gabriel
AU - Schneider Daniel Rolph
JN - Thermal Science
PY - 2012
VL - 16
IS - 3
SP - 759
EP - 772
PT - Article
AB - The necessity of the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, as formulated in  the Kyoto Protocol, imposes the need for improving environmental aspects of  existing thermal power plants operation. Improvements can be reached either  by efficiency increment or by implementation of emission reduction measures.  Investments in refurbishment of existing plant components or in plant  upgrading by flue gas desulphurization, by primary and secondary measures of  nitrogen oxides reduction, or by biomass co-firing, are usually accompanied  by modernisation of thermal power plant instrumentation and control system  including sensors, equipment diagnostics and advanced controls. Impact of  advanced control solutions implementation depends on technical  characteristics and status of existing instrumentation and control systems as  well as on design characteristics and actual conditions of installed plant  components. Evaluation of adequacy of implementation of advanced control  concepts is especially important in Western Balkan region where thermal power  plants portfolio is rather diversified in terms of size, type and  commissioning year and where generally poor maintenance and lack of  investments in power generation sector resulted in high greenhouse gases  emissions and low efficiency of plants in operation. This paper is intended  to present possibilities of implementation of advanced control concepts, and  particularly those based on artificial intelligence, in selected thermal  power plants in order to increase plant efficiency and to lower pollutants  emissions and to comply with environmental quality standards prescribed in  large combustion plant directive. [Acknowledgements. This paper has been  created within WBalkICT - Supporting Common RTD actions in WBCs for  developing Low Cost and Low Risk ICT based solutions for TPPs Energy  Efficiency increasing, SEE-ERA.NET plus project in cooperation among partners  from IPA SA - Romania, University of Zagreb - Croatia and Vinca Institute  from Serbia and. The project has initiated a strong scientific cooperation,  with innovative approaches, high scientific level, in order to correlate in  an optimal form, using ICT last generation solutions, the procedures and  techniques from fossil fuels burning processes thermodynamics, mathematical  modelling, modern methods of flue gases analysis, combustion control,  Artificial Intelligence Systems with focus on Expert Systems category.]