Novel gas turbine configurations for carbon capture

Supervisors: Professor M Pourkashanian, Professor L Ma, Professor K Hughes

Natural gas will play a significant role in the future energy mix. Natural gas combined cycle (NGCC) power plants produce around half the emissions of advanced coal-fired power plants. However, even if natural gas is used to replace all coal consumption, the reduced emissions would not meet the global reduction targets set by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Therefore, NGCC with post-combustion CO2 capture can have a benefit in the next-generation power systems. One key challenge of integrating carbon capture with an NGCC power plant is that the plant efficiency is reduced by about 15%. As a result, novel configurations are needed to increase the plant efficiency and power output of the system.

Some options are exhaust gas recirculation (EGR), humid air turbine (HAT), steam and water injection, and hybrid systems. These configurations can be assessed by simulation software tools to identify technical advantages of the proposed modifications.

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