In 2014, the total market for air and water monitoring including field and laboratory instruments will exceed $22 billion. Of this total, $2.6 billion will be spent by the power industry. In this segment, more than $350 million will be spent for air, water, liquid and gas measurement at gas turbine and combined cycle plants.  Industrial gas turbine operators provide an additional market. Seventy-five million will be spent by the oil and gas extraction and processing, refining and other industrial operators of gas turbines for their monitoring needs.  These forecasts segmented for each country are displayed in Air and Water Monitoring World Market, published by the McIlvaine Company.  (www.mcilvainecompany.com)

This year, 75,000 MW of new utility electrical generating turbines will be added to a world base of 1,100,000 MW already installed.   In addition, a large number of smaller turbines will be purchased by industrial plants which are generating electricity and steam or are compressing gases and use gas turbines to provide the compression power. 

One of the fastest growing industrial sectors is the application of gas turbines for landfill and sewage plant biogas.  These plants require the measurement of formaldehyde or other organic compounds.  Measurement of H₂S is also required.  Some utility and industrial operators burn oil.  Those units burning fuel oil as a secondary fuel typically need to install SO₂ monitors. 

Nearly all the turbines regardless of the application must measure NO_x continuously.  In some cases this can be done with predictive systems, but more typically is accomplished with continuous emissions monitoring systems.   It is also often necessary to install selective catalytic reduction (SCR) systems which use ammonia as a reagent.   Continuous measurement of the ammonia slip is necessary for both control and regulatory goals.  It is also necessary to install a second set of NO_x analyzers to determine both the raw NO_x as well as the NO_x in the stack.

In the simple cycle mode, it is often necessary to add tempering air prior to the selective catalytic reduction systems.  Measurement of gas flow and temperature is, therefore, required at multiple locations.

Some turbines are operated in the simple cycle mode, so no water is necessary for cooling condensate.  However, even these units require fogging or inlet air cooling systems using deionized water.  Hence, monitoring water quality is necessary.  For combined cycle operation, dry cooling is becoming more popular. However, the vast majority of systems use wet cooling towers.   Companies such as Nalco and GE have automated chemistry systems to measure the parameters and add chemicals to maximize the number of times the water can be recycled.

The cooling water blowdown requires measurement of pollutant levels before and after final purification.  Zero liquid discharge systems are becoming popular.  These require various filtration and evaporation steps, all with air and water monitoring requirements.

Monitoring the feedwater and the condensate where heat recovery steam generators are utilized requires very accurate monitors for dissolved oxygen, flow, pH and other parameters.

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