Power Air Quality Insights No

				Power Air Quality Insights No. 32 November 28, 2011

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· “Measuring Particulate Continuously” is “Hot Topic Hour” on December 1, 2011

“Measuring Particulate Continuously” is “Hot Topic Hour” on December 1, 2011

Since the Utility MACT was first proposed by the EPA in May, many persons have expressed concern over the ability of the industry to accurately measure mass particulates at the limits proposed by EPA. In various presentations both during McIlvaine Company Hot Topic Hours and elsewhere, concerned parties have questioned the accuracy and efficacy of the EPA test procedures. Some have presented evidence of errors and biases in and between various test procedures. Measurement accuracy can have a serious impact on existing sources that may not meet the new limits once the MACT and the proposed test methods within it and the Cross State Air Pollution (transport) Rule (CSAPR) become the law of the land.

The following speakers will describe the current and proposed methods for continuous measurement of particulates, tell participants what they need to do to ensure accurate, repeatable data and to discuss the implications for the utility industry of errors in their measurement data.

Derek Stuart, Market Sector Manager for Combustion and Environmental at AMETEK Land, will discuss opacity measurement for determining the PM in stack gases. The use of transmissometry to measure smoke and dust emissions from stacks dates back to the work of Professor Ringelmann in the 19th century. For many years, continuous opacity monitors have been used to demonstrate compliance with emissions regulations in the USA. Calibrating an opacity monitor to measure PM according to 40 CFR 60 Appendix B Performance Standard 11 is relatively straightforward and provides a direct, reliable measurement of PM concentration.

David Moll, Senior Program Manager at AECOM Environment, will discuss the different types of continuous particulate emission monitors, their measurement techniques and limitations to perform measurements on certain emission sources. He will review EPA certification requirements for PM CEMs and the EPA test procedures used to correlate these instruments. He will also discuss upcoming challenges for industry if included in the final Utility MACT regulations.

Craig Clapsaddle, BetaGuard PM Sales Manager at Mechanical Systems, Inc, will briefly describe the MSI BetaGuard PM CEM and discuss what companies can do to insure accurate, repeatable data from their PM CEMs.

Anand Mamidipudi, Product Line Manager, Systems at Thermo Fisher Scientific/Thermo Environmental Instruments.

Kevin Crosby, Technical Director at The Avogadro Group, LLC, Stationary Source Testing

The EPA Performance Specification for PM CEMS requires a significant amount of testing for determination of the system's accuracy and precision. The presentation will describe the daily and periodic procedures required to assure the quality of the data from the monitoring system. These include initial calibration and correlation testing, daily calibration checks and quarterly audits - Absolute Correlation Audits, Response Correlation Audits and Relative Response Audits. These procedures include a significant number of particulate emission test runs using EPA reference methods, so costs can become significant. Some potential certification and auditing problems will be described so that plant personnel may plan for success and for cost control.

A $1 billion per year new market will be created with the promulgation of the rule to require Maximum Achievable Control Technology (MACT) for utility power generators in the U.S. Revenues will be a mix of capital equipment and consumables according to the McIlvaine Company in its continually updated, Mercury Air Reduction Markets.

This one rule will completely transform the activated carbon industry in the U.S. The big market in the past has been to treat water. The usage is 500 million pounds per year. The usage in air treatment was less than 50 million pounds per year but sharply increased in the past two years as a number of utilities were required to meet MACT rules promulgated by individual states. When the Federal MACT rule takes effect, the utility air market alone will exceed the water market. The industry has anticipated the demand. The traditional suppliers, Calgon Carbon and Norit, have expanded capacity. Albemarle has acquired Sorbent Technologies and positioned itself as a major supplier. ADA-ES has entered the market with construction of a large activated carbon plant.

There is considerable uncertainty about the ultimate size of the market. On one hand, there is attractive potential for activated carbon in related applications. Presently, selenium is being captured in power plant scrubbers. It is subsequently removed from the wastewater with an expensive biological wastewater treatment system. Plants with scrubbers would not normally consider activated carbon purchases. However, the removal of the selenium may warrant the purchase.

Another use in scrubbers is to recirculate activated carbon in the scrubber slurry. Evonik has pioneered this approach as a means of removing the mercury from the wastewater sludge. The mercury laden carbon is separated from the wastewater using hydrocyclones. This allows disposal of the sludge as a non-hazardous material.

There is also negative uncertainty, as other chemicals will take market share away from activated carbon. There are some sorbents which are injected in a manner identical to activated carbon. The purpose is to adsorb the mercury by presenting a large surface area. So far none of these has proven to be more cost effective.

The bigger threat comes from chemicals injected with the coal for the purpose of chemical change rather than adsorption. Oxides of mercury are much more soluble than elemental mercury. Halogen compounds including bromium and chlorine can oxidize most of the mercury in the flue gas. The result is that scrubbers can then efficiently remove the oxides. The uncertainty arises relative to how efficient this removal process may be.

The uncertainty is increased by the wide variations between fuels and boiler types and the many factors which influence efficiency of removal. There is further uncertainty as to the influence of the multi-pollutant requirement impact on mercury removal choices. The necessity to remove hydrogen chloride and toxic metals other than mercury is a factor.

Ultimately the PM_2.5 ambient air quality rules may have the largest impact on mercury reduction choices. Conceivably they could force scrubbers to achieve 98 percent or even 99 percent SO₂ removal. This would dictate the use of wet rather than dry scrubbers. It would dictate chemical oxidation rather than adsorption.

The impact of PM_2.5 is not likely to manifest itself until 2016 or 2017 and maybe even later. In fact, if the rest of the U.S. follows the Los Angeles example, it will be a slow process. A state will promulgate one rule assuming this will meet the ambient air target. A few years later, when it is clear that additional reduction is necessary, it will promulgate another rule, so compliance could take decades.

Utilities are likely to take a two-stage approach. The capital investment in activated carbon injection equipment is modest. So many companies may ultimately remove mercury first with activated carbon and later with chemical oxidation and scrubbing.

Advances in solar technology are being made at a steady rate. A few of the recent improvements reported in McIlvaine’s Renewable Energy Update and Projects follow.

U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu announced the offer of a conditional commitment for a $150 million loan guarantee to 1366 Technologies, Inc. for the development of a multicrystalline wafer manufacturing project. The project will be capable of producing approximately 700 to 1,000 MW of silicon-based wafers annually using a revolutionary manufacturing process called Direct Wafer. The innovative process could reduce manufacturing costs of the wafers by approximately 50 percent, dramatically cutting the cost of solar power. Phase 1 of the project will be located in Lexington, MA and is expected to generate 70 permanent jobs and 50 construction jobs. The company is evaluating site locations for another planned phase, which they anticipate will create hundreds of additional jobs.

First Solar, Inc. announced it set a new world record for cadmium-telluride (CdTe) PV solar cell efficiency, reaching 17.3 percent with a test cell constructed using commercial-scale manufacturing equipment and materials. The test cell’s performance, confirmed by the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL), far surpassed the previous record of 16.7 percent set in 2001.

The average efficiency of First Solar modules produced in the first quarter of 2011 was 11.7 percent, up from 11.1 percent a year earlier, and the company has recorded full-module efficiencies over 13.5 percent, with a 13.4 percent module confirmed by NREL. First Solar’s module efficiency roadmap sets a goal for production-module efficiencies of 13.5-14.5 percent by the end of 2014.

XsunX, Inc., the developer of CIGSolar^™ , a hybrid, thin-film photovoltaic (TFPV) solar cell manufacturing process, announced that the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) certified the peak efficiency conversion of 16.36 percent achieved by XsunX, Inc. for Copper-Indium-Gallium-(di)selenide (CIGS) photovoltaic devices.

Overall efficiency of tested samples ranged from15.3 percent to 16.36 percent producing an average efficiency of 15.91 percent. The sample provided to NREL was part of a 125mm substrate which after deposition was sub-divided into quadrants to produce NREL device test structures and analytical equipment test structures. The purpose was to provide a statistically significant body of data in support of XsunX’s continuous process improvement efforts.

The company’s technology utilizes co-evaporation for rapid deposition of final-sized cells to better control the complex management of the CIGS layer deposition process. The company’s method, unlike other CIGS manufacturing technology, begins and ends using individual substrates sized to match silicon cells. In addition to providing for a smaller and more precise deposition environment, this also helps to avid performance losses experienced when cells are either cut from rolls of CIGS material or mismatched electrically in monolithic assemblies.

Southwest Solar Technologies, Inc. announced the successful on-sun testing and proof of concept of a high temperature air receiver. The high temperature air receiver is a prototype test component to validate the design for the advanced solar-turbine power system being developed by the company. The company’s system uses a parabolic solar dish with mirrors to concentrate the sun’s energy to power a high-efficiency turbine engine and produce electricity.

The testing was conducted using the company’s, 320 square meter solar concentrating dish, the largest solar dish in North America. The dish is capable of delivering over a quarter megawatt of thermal energy in the form of concentrated sunlight, focusing the equivalent heat of 2,000 suns into the proprietary design “receiver.” Inside this receiver compressed air is super-heated to power a high speed turbine alternator. Initial testing was conducted with attenuation screens on the dish to reduce the input energy to 50 kWth, approximately 20 percent of full capacity. Even at this reduced power, the receiver operated at the temperature goal of 925 C (1700 F), and met goals for efficiency.

“This high temperature performance achieved far exceeds typical 400°C temperature of other concentrating solar power (CS) systems, such as trough and power towers, that use steam turbine technology to produce electricity, and the system requires no water cooling. The company’s unique air based turbine cycle, operating at much higher temperatures, is designed to achieve greater than 30 percent efficiency. This efficiency would far exceed typical PV or other CSP solar power systems,” said Herb Hayden, Chief Technical Officer.

Solar3D, Inc., the developer of a breakthrough 3-dimensional solar cell technology to maximize the conversion of sunlight into electricity, announced that it is consulting with outside manufacturing experts to optimize the prototype design for low-cost mass production.

Inspired by light management techniques used in fiber optic devices, the company’s innovative solar cell technology utilizes a 3-dimensional design to trap sunlight inside micro-photovoltaic structures where photons bounce around until they are converted into electrons. Solar3D’s management believes that this breakthrough solar cell design will dramatically change the economics of solar energy.