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The efficiency of a conventional steam–electric power plant, defined as energy produced by the plant divided by the heating value of the fuel consumed by it, is typically 33 to 48%, limited as all heat engines are by the laws of thermodynamics (See: Carnot cycle). The rest of the energy must leave the plant in the form of heat.
Fuels such as natural gas or oil can also be burnt directly in gas turbines (internal combustion), skipping the steam generation step. These plants can be of the open cycle or the more efficient combined cycle type. The majority of the world's thermal power stations are driven by steam turbines, gas turbines, or a combination of the two.
Construction of a first reference plant, the Yaomeng power plant in China, commenced in 2001. On 3 June 2014, the Australian government's research organization CSIRO announced that they had generated 'supercritical steam' at a pressure of 23.5 MPa (3,410 psi) and 570 °C (1,060 °F) in what it claims is a world record for solar thermal energy. [5]
In contrast to a "subcritical boiler", a supercritical steam generator operates at such a high pressure (over 3,200 psi or 22.06 MPa) that actual boiling ceases to occur, the boiler has no liquid water - steam separation. There is no generation of steam bubbles within the water, because the pressure is above the critical pressure at which steam ...
The turbine's hot exhaust powers a steam power plant (operating by the Rankine cycle). This is a combined cycle gas turbine (CCGT) plant. These achieve a best-of-class real (see below) thermal efficiency of around 64% in base-load operation. In contrast, a single cycle steam power plant is limited to efficiencies from 35 to 42%.
Steam turbine CHP plants that use the heating system as the steam condenser for the steam turbine; Nuclear power plants, similar to other steam turbine power plants, can be fitted with extractions in the turbines to bleed partially expanded steam to a heating system. With a heating system temperature of 95 °C it is possible to extract about 10 ...
The advent of large steam turbines made central-station electricity generation practical, since reciprocating steam engines of large rating became very bulky, and operated at slow speeds. Most central stations are fossil fuel power plants and nuclear power plants ; some installations use geothermal steam, or use concentrated solar power (CSP ...
The inverted U-tube bundle of a Combustion Engineering steam generator. A steam generator (aka nuclear steam raising plant ('NSRP')) is a heat exchanger used to convert water into steam from heat produced in a nuclear reactor core. It is used in pressurized water reactors (PWRs), between the primary and secondary coolant loops.