Mark A. Douglas

Residential Total Energy System Installation at the Canadian Centre for Housing Technology

ABSTRACT Distributed cogeneration in single households may provide a viable alternative to the construction of new central power plants in the coming years. A key issue in residential cogeneration is how to size and integrate the required technologies to satisfy the total energy needs of the household, consisting of electricity, domestic hot water, space heating and space cooling. An interesting pathway to a more sustainable future involves the use of the earth surrounding the home as both a source and a sink for energy, especially if it enables the recycling of summertime waste heat from the generator. This demonstration project was planned and implemented at the Canadian Centre for Housing Technology (CCHT) in 2006. The CCHT, located on the campus of the National Research Council in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada maintains two detached, single-family houses that have the capacity to assess energy and building technologies with daily simulated occupancy effects. This article describes the residential total ener...

Economics of CO2 Capture from a Coal-Fired Power Plant — a Sensitivity Analysis

Publisher Summary This chapter focuses on the economics of the capture of CO 2 from an existing pulverized coal-fired power plant. Coal-fired power plants are regarded as major emitters of pollutants, in particular of carbon dioxide. However, coal is still a very attractive fuel because of cheap, large, and widely distributed reserves. Increasing the efficiency of the coal plant will contribute to the reduction in the emissions of CO 2 . But it is unlikely that increased efficiency alone is sufficient to significantly reduce CO 2 emissions. A method to dramatically reduce the emissions of CO 2 in the short to medium term is the capture and sequestration of CO 2 . This chapter presents a sensitivity analysis on the cost of CO 2 captured. In particular, the chapter looks at the effect of improvement in solvent performance and oxygen separation cost (O 2 /CO 2 recycle case) on the overall cost of capturing CO 2 . The sensitivity analysis provides the economic benefits from possible cost reductions in the two CO 2 capture technologies. Preliminary results indicate that the O 2 /CO 2 recycle combustion process offers greater potential savings over the use of amine scrubbing.

Oxy-fuel coal burner design: From CFD modeling to pilot scale testing

Publisher Summary This chapter focuses on a sequence of combustion tests performed on the Vertical Combustor Research Facility of the CANMET Energy Technology Centre to calculate the performance of a burner design optimized for oxy-fuel combustion of coal. In addition, the chapter evaluates burner and combustor design concepts for lower NOx during O2 firing based on recommendations made by CFD modeling. The tests are carried out with a high volatile lignite coal at a heat input of 0.21 MWth, with both air firing and oxygen firing. The flue gas compositions are monitored during the tests and extensive flame probing is conducted. All tests are executed using a high volatile lignite coal. Extensive flame sampling, including temperature and major species, is conducted and radial and axial measurements are performed. As a result, the new burner emitted considerably lower NOx compared to previous ones. This test made it possible to bring NOx emissions to below 0.15 lb/MBTU while firing in O2/RFG mode. Results confirmed the superiority of the current design by considerably decreasing NOx formation during oxygen firing of the coal while maintaining excellent fuel burnout.