Deposition prevention for future power stations - an international collaboration with USA

Supervisors: Professor Mohamed Pourkashanian, Professor Lin Ma and Dr Kevin Hughes.

The concern over the environment impact of burning fossil fuels for power generation and fluctuations in the fuel price have led to the power plants increasingly using variable fuels and biomass. Some of these fuels often have very different chemical compositions and can cause severe deposition inside the combustion furnace and this can potentially lead to a substantial reduction in the efficiency of the boiler and unscheduled boiler shutdown.

This has become a significant operational constraint for existing power stations to expand their range of fuel diet. Thus predicting deposition and slagging propensity is of vital importance to power plants running new fuels.

This PhD studentship will support the research on particulate behaviours of new fuels and develop novel predictive models for slagging and fouling in industrial furnaces. The project will be built on existing research, which has previously been carried out for many years by the Sheffield team, with the measurement data from the national PACT facilities and in collaboration with Electric Power Research Institute in the USA.

For further information contact Professor Derek B Ingham (d.ingham@sheffield.ac.uk).