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Keywords: Acceptance test, black liquor, boiler efficiency, energy There is a newly accepted European standard for steam generator
balance, recovery boiler acceptance tests: EN 12952-15:2003 “Water-tube boilers and
auxiliary installations - Part 15: Acceptance tests” [3]. This paper
ABSTRACT examines how the standard can be applied to recovery boilers.
Recovery boiler mass and energy balances are needed for the Because this standard does not give answers to kraft recovery boiler
performance testing of recovery boilers, mill energy wide control specific questions, some additional definitions have been made to
systems, and in calculating the air emission data. Typically, recovery e.g. calculate some heat losses. Borate autocausticization in the
boiler balances are mainly based on 1996 TAPPI publication recovery boiler furnace has been included. This type of operation
“Performance Test Procedure: Sodium Base Recovery Units”, the takes currently place in some Scandinavian mills. The balances are
use of which is problematic in Europe because of its view that the thus based on the as-fired liquor flow and as-fired liquor dry solids.
losses from the recovery of process chemicals are counted when The mass and energy balances are made for the unit mass flow of
determining the recovery boiler steam generation efficiency. A low the as-fired liquor.
efficiency leads to taxation and legislative problems in some European
countries. There is a newly accepted European standard for steam BALANCE CALCULATIONS
generator acceptance tests: EN 12952-15:2003 “Water-tube boilers Recovery boiler mass and energy balances have been presented
and auxiliary installations - Part 15: Acceptance tests”. This paper by Gullichsen [4], Clement et al. [5], Adams and Frederick [6], and
examines how the standard could be applied to recovery boilers to Vakkilainen [7]. The conventions used to express the heat used in
find out the net efficiency which is shown to be approximately the the reduction and the heat losses as smelt are for every author
same as for other biomass boilers, not 10% lower. A new and more similar to the Tappi standard [1] that covers exclusively the recovery
accurate method to calculate losses from convection and conduction boiler mass and energy balance calculation.
is discussed. In addition, a suggestion on how to handle borate
autocausticization in the recovery boiler furnace is made. Boiler efficiency
The boiler efficiency is a measure of the goodness of the chosen
INTRODUCTION process and equipment to transfer the combustion heat to the heat
Recovery boiler mass and energy balances are needed for the in steam. For the best solid fuel boilers, the boiler efficiency is 86 …
performance testing of recovery boilers, mill energy wide control 90% [8]. Oil and natural gas fired boilers can achieve 90 … 94%
systems and in calculating the air emission data. There is no suitable efficiency. The boiler efficiency can be defined as the ratio of the
procedure for modern recovery boilers. Current recovery boiler useful heat output to the total energy input.
balances are mainly based on 1996 TAPPI publication “Performance
Test Procedure: Sodium Base Recovery Units” [1] the use of which 1
is problematic in Europe because of US units and its view that the
losses from the recovery of process chemicals are counted when
determining the recovery boiler steam generation efficiency. General where η is the boiler efficiency
steam generator balances have been based on the outdated DIN Q abs is the useful heat absorbed (heat transferred to steam)
1942 “Acceptance Test on Steam Generators” [2], which fails to Q in is the heat and energy input into the boiler
mention recovery boilers.
*Authors’ references:
1. Lappeenranta University of Technology, P.O. Box. 20, FI-53581 Lappeenranta, Finland
2. Aalto University, P.O. Box 4100, FIN-02015, Espoo, Finland
E-mails: esa.vakkilainen@lut.fi , pekka.ahtila@aalto.fi
To determine the efficiency of a boiler, a system must be defined and Comments for system boundary definition
the energy flows that cross the system boundaries must be resolved. Most of the important subsystems are inside the system boundary:
System boundaries should be chosen so that it is possible to define black liquor preheating and the associated equipment that increase
all the energy and mass flows in and out with sufficient accuracy. In the heat input and all the equipment starting from the first heat
practice, many minor flows are usually neglected. When determining transfer surface, air preheater, including all the steam and water heat
the boiler efficiency, all internal reactions and recirculations can be exchangers that cool the flue gas as they remove heat from flue gas
neglected. The determination of boiler efficiency can be done with and transfer it to steam/water. If forced circulation pumps are used,
only flows through the system boundaries. they are inside the system boundary.
In a simple boiler process, the fuel and the required amount Many important subsystems are outside the system boundary. Black
of combustion air are fed into the boiler. The fuel reacts with the liquor handling, storing and feeding equipment affect only the incoming
oxygen in the boiler and the flue gas is drawn out. The released heat black liquor properties. Air fans and air ducts affect the entering air
is captured to the water pumped into the boiler which transforms it temperature. Smelt handling and dissolving tank occur after the smelt
to the steam that flows from the boiler. exits the recovery boiler. Flue gas cleaning equipment affects the flue
It is clear that the system boundaries can be drawn in many ways. gas after it exits the boiler. A possible fan for flue gas affects the flue
For example, the boiler house might form a convenient system gas after it exits the boiler. The control system, instrumentation and
boundary. It has been pointed out that the losses and heat input electrification do not loose heat to the steam/water system.
caused by fans, blowers and pumps should not affect the boiler
efficiency. On the other hand, forced circulation pumps, flue gas MATERIAL AND ENERGY BALANCE
recirculation fans and other internal process devices should be taken The control of combustion requires air flow that matches the fuel flow.
into account because they play a role when the boiler efficiencies The amount of air required to burn a mass unit of black liquor depends
between different types of boilers are compared. Therefore, the mainly on the water content and the heating value of the fuel. It is only
system boundary for the boiler efficiency loosely includes some but the organics in black liquor that combust. A black liquor heating value
not all the equipment inside the boiler house. increase, Figure 2, means that more air is needed for the combustion.
A system boundary for the boiler efficiency measurement is Figures like Figure 2 can be used to estimate the required air flow for
determined in an equivalent way to the definition in EN 12952-15. the dimensioning of the fans. More importantly, they should be used to
Figure 1 shows a typical system boundary for a recovery boiler. All estimate the possible range of air flows. A recovery boiler should be able
flow values are recorded when the flow crosses the system boundary. to handle not only the design black liquor, but a range of typical black
liquors. Normally, the actual design and performance estimation is done
using the actual black liquor elemental composition.
Typical biofuels consist of carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, sulfur, and
oxygen. Black liquor contains also a high amount of ash; sodium,
potassium and chloride compounds. It is often impossible to
define the individual chemical compounds that form the fuel. The
stoichiometric air demand can be calculated assuming that the fuel
can be divided into three fractions: i) organic portion, which combusts
fully, ii) reactive inorganic portion, which reacts to predefined end
products, iii) inactive portion, which passes through the combustion
system unchanged.
The basis for material calculations is typically one mass unit of
black liquor. If mass balance values for one mass unit are known, it is
easy to formulate the mass balance for a known load by multiplying
all values with a single factor.
Figure 2. Black liquor air demand as a function of the lower heating value
as some of the air is infiltration air through various openings. The Problems in determining efficiency with the direct method
flue gas flow at stack can be significantly higher than through the Acceptance standard EN 12952-15:2003 “Water-tube boilers
economizers because of the same reason. and auxiliary installations - Part 15: Acceptance tests” states that
the efficiency can be calculated with a direct method. When mass
Useful heat output flows, specific heat values and temperatures are known, the heat
The useful heat output includes all the heats to all of the steam input with preheated air and fuel can be calculated using e.g. the
flows. This value depends on the boiler type and the boundaries with following simplified formula
which the boiler efficiency is calculated. Normally, the useful heat
output can be defined as 3
2
where Qms is the heat transferred to main steam or with the states of the flows as
Qrh is the heat transferred to reheat steam
Qbd is the heat transferred to blow down 4
The steam used to heat air or sootblowing are not taken into account.
where:
Heat and energy input Hu is the heating value of fuel
The energy input consists of two components. One is proportional mf is the fuel mass flow
to the fuel flow, and the other does not depend on the fuel flow. The Qf is the heat transferred to preheated fuel
energy flows that depend on the fuel flow are: Qa is the heat transferred to preheated air
- Chemical energy in the main fuel, Hu (heat of combustion) P is the sum of mechanical end electrical energy input flows
- Chemical energy in the auxiliary fuels, Hu (heat of combustion) mms is the main steam mass flow
- Energy included in the fuel preheating, Qf mrh is the reheat steam mass flow
- Energy included in the air preheating, Qa mbd is the blow down mass flow
Examples of energy flows that are somewhat independent of the ma is the air mass flow
fuel flow are shaft powers of the flue gas and air fans, shaft powers hms is the enthalpy of main steam
of circulation pumps, and the energy input by flue gas recirculation hfw is the enthalpy of feedwater steam
fan. It is customary to treat the useful heat input as a difference hbd is the enthalpy of blowdown
of input and output values. This means that the useful heat is the hrh,out is the outlet enthalpy of reheat steam
difference between the enthalpies of output flows and input flows. hrh,in is the inlet enthalpy of reheat steam
Therefore, it is logical that many energy flows are not considered as hf,out is the outlet enthalpy of fuel
input flows. Such input flows include the heat in the feedwater, the hf,in is the inlet enthalpy of fuel
heat in the desuperheating water flow and the heat in the incoming ha,out is the outlet enthalpy of air
steam flow to the reheater. hain is the inlet enthalpy of air
The above presented formula is a very simple formula. It ignores the heat that can be released in the combustion of black liquor. Other
most of the energy flows that cross the boundary. We note that at large sources are the sensible heats in black liquor and air preheating.
least the following streams, typical for the recovery boiler, have
not been accounted for: NCG-flows, methanol, turpentine flows, Useful heat
condensate, leakage air, sootblowing, other electricity flows, flows The useful heat can be calculated by subtracting the sum of heat
to and from flue gas cleaning, atomizing steam, auxiliary fuels, and losses from the total heat input. The useful heat is the heat than can
HVAC streams. be used to generate steam and the heat that is used in reduction and
It can be argued that these streams are minor and do not autocausticizing reactions.
affect the calculation. It is difficult to assess their effect a Figure 4 shows how the total heat input is used. Most of the heat
priori without measuring them. Thus, the need to measure input is converted to steam. Reduction reactions are responsible for
many flows is one of the main problems in the direct efficiency almost half of the rest. Autocausticizing with borate takes quite little
measurement. Another problem arises from the theory of heat. The biggest actual losses are the heat lost with wet flue gases
mathematical uncertainty associated with the measurements. and the sensible heat in smelt.
As each and every stream needs to be measured, the error in
the efficiency becomes quickly very large. Therefore, the direct
method is very seldom used in practice.
5
and even further as
6
Figure 4. Example heat outputs of a recovery boiler
where Qloss,i is the i:th heat lost
Heat for reduction
The main losses in a recovery boiler steam generator are: the A recovery boiler recovers heat from the combustion of organics
heat lost with the flue gases, the losses of unburned combustible in the black liquor. In addition, it converts inorganic materials from
fuel, the sensible heat in the smelt flow (ashes), and the radiation their oxidized state to the reduced state. All this is useful work and
and conduction losses. Most of these losses can be estimated to consumes usually about 10% of the heat input. It should be taken
a greater accuracy than the actual flows. The indirect method, into account in the recovery boiler net efficiency.
therefore, gives a higher accuracy when estimating the efficiency
of the steam generator. 7
As one can see from Figure 3, most of the heat input comes from
where QdR is the sum of heats to reduction
9
Figure 3. Example heat inputs to a recovery boiler
A modern recovery boiler is well in the range of the efficiencies of Ash pickup with evaporator liquor
other biofuel boilers. The way boiler and ESP ash is mixed to the black liquor does
not matter. The mixing tank is placed outside the boiler balance
RECOVERY BOILER SPECIFIC QUESTIONS IN BALANCE boundary. This way it does not matter for the boiler balance whether
Using European standard EN 12952-15:2003 “Water-tube boilers it has a modern ash pickup with evaporator liquor or a traditional
and auxiliary installations - Part 15: Acceptance tests” for recovery ash mixing to incoming liquor. The ash from recovery boiler increases
boiler balances, one needs to define some specific details: how with the boiler load and black liquor dry solids. Figure 5 represents
to take into account NCG (DNCG and CNCG), the dissolving tank an estimate for ash flows from a modern recovery boiler. As the ash
vent gases, the methanol and turpentine, and the ash pickup with flow is notoriously difficult to measure, a figure of this kind can be
evaporator liquor, and determine the radiation and convection losses. agreed to show the ash flow during the balance case. Dust flow in
Figure 5 is represented by the following equations
DNCG combustion in the balance qESP = 0.3509*ds-(2800-HHRR)/1000*5.6158-6.865 ± 3 10
The combustion of dilute non condensable gases (HVLC) in qECO = 0.1*ds-4 ± 2 11
recovery boilers should be treated like introducing wet additional qBB = 1 ± 1 12
air, if not otherwise agreed upon. If DNCG burning is allowed, their where
sulphur content needs to be very low. These gases do not typically qESP is the dust flow to electrostatic precipitator divided by dry flue
contain combustibles. The error in the efficiency is small. gas flow at 3% O2, g/m3n, dry
qECO is the dust flow from economizer hoppers divided by dry flue
CNCG combustion in the balance gas flow at 3% O2, g/m3n, dry
The combustion of concentrated non condensable gases (LVHC) in qBB is the dust flow from boiler bank hopper divided by dry flue
recovery boilers should be treated like burning auxiliary fuel. In the gas flow at 3% O2, g/m3n, dry
performance test, the heating value and the analysis in the contract ds is the as-fired black liquor dry solids, %
corrected to actual conditions (water content) can be used. HHRR is the heart heat release rate, kJ/m2
Figure 5. Effect of black liquor dry solids to dust flows; BB ash is the lowest line, ECO ash next higher line, ESP ash the upper lines at different HHRR
(dry solids, temperature) can be used. If the contract has no specified Borate
values, then a value from reliable literature [9] can be used. There are some mills in Scandinavia that use borate
autocausticization [11]. Borate compounds can be treated similarly
Heat lost with the flue gases to sulfur compounds.
The biggest heat loss from a steam generator is the heat lost with
the exiting flue gas. The flue gas loss depends on the final flue gas Loss in electrostatic precipitator ash
temperature and the amount of flue gases. Thus, the higher the air The heat loss in ash is usually small enough that even high
ratio the higher the flue gas losses. The flue gases should leave the inaccuracies in the ash loss determination usually have a negligible
boiler at a temperature as low as possible to minimize the flue gas effect on the accuracy of overall efficiency.
losses. Usually, either economics, equipment or corrosion issues limit
the flue gas temperature between 150ºC and 200ºC. RADIATION AND CONVECTION HEAT LOSSES
There are some losses from the hot boiler walls to the surroundings.
Losses in the unburned combustibles Part of this energy increases the incoming air temperature. The
The fuels fired into the boiler will not combust totally. amount of heat recovery does not affect the boiler efficiency but
Thermodynamics limits the combustion process to some finite affects the amount of heat needed for air preheat. Radiation and
value. This means e.g. that there is always some CO, H2 and other convection heat losses do not depend on the boiler load. Radiation
hydrocarbons present in the flue gases. When burning biofuels, some and convection heat losses from the recovery boiler are hard to
carbon tends to remain unburned. This means that some carbon measure because there are many flows in and out to the space
remains in the ash. Carbon in the ashes captured from the flue gases surrounding the boiler proper inside the recovery boiler building.
is mixed with black liquor. This means that no losses occur. Usually The radiation and convection heat loss can be estimated through
the carbon content in modern recovery boilers is extremely low. equation 16. The coefficient 0.0257 is between coal (0.022) and
Some unburned carbon exits with the smelt. The heat lost with this lignite (0.0315) boiler values [11]. This equation with Tappi loss
stream is very low. function is presented graphically in Figure 6.
where
Hsmelt is the enthalpy of smelt, J
mi is the mass of component i, kg
hc,i is the specific enthalpy of component i, J/kg
Table 1. Calculated heat losses compared to measured heat losses from Finnish recovery boilers [10]
17
where H is the hydrogen mass fraction in black liquor Figure 7. Black liquor higher heating value as function of lower heating value
Mi is the mole weight of i, kg/kmol
Black liquor hydrogen to carbon ratio is practically constant and the about 0.1 MJ/kgds. The correlation shown in equation 18 is valid
black liquor higher heating value is a function of carbon content. Therefore, for all kinds of black liquors, Figure 7.
with a very good accuracy, the lower heating value of black liquor dry
solids can be presented as a function of the higher heating value ERROR ANALYSIS
Errors associated with the measuring equipment and analysis
18 methods will affect the result of the performance test. All
used measuring equipment should be calibrated before the
Typically, the lower heating value of dry black liquor is about performance test. If the result of an individual measurement
0.7 MJ/kgds less than the higher heating value. It should be has not been subjected to a closer error analysis, the error in the
noted that, generally, the analysis accuracy of heating value is efficiency can be assumed to be according to Table 2.
DISCUSSION is recommended that the maximum allowable flows for each stream
A method to calculate the recovery boiler efficiency based on during the performance testing are defined. Typically changes in
the lower heating value has been presented. Calculating recovery these additional streams cannot be accepted during the performance
boiler efficiency based on EN 12952-15:2003 “Water-tube boilers testing. It is recommended that the testing is done with all typical
and auxiliary installations - Part 15: Acceptance tests” can be additional flows on. Such flows are waste acids from the chemical
done if the recovery boiler specific questions are accounted for. manufacture and biosludge. Similarly, all individual flows to the
The recovery boiler efficiency is similar to the efficiency of other furnace, like DNCG, CNCG and dissolving tank vent gases, should be
biomass boilers if the process work that goes into reducing operated during the performance testing.
reactions is taken into account.
The use of this analysis for other types of boilers than modern Acknowledgements
kraft recovery boilers needs careful consideration. Without changes, This paper is based on the document “Recovery boiler performance
its application to other types of boilers is not possible. Modifications testing - Material and energy balance” [13] which has been compiled
are needed to accommodate NSSC boilers, magnesium and calcium under the Finnish Recovery Boiler Committee’s Black Liquor Sub-
based recovery units, boilers with direct contact evaporators, and committee. The chairman was Keijo Salmenoja - Oy Metsä-Botnia Ab.
gasification of black liquor. One of the biggest differences to earlier The members were Esa Ruonala Stora - Enso Oyj, Sanna Siltala -
procedures is that this work includes all the applicable flows to UPM-Kymmene Oyj, Aki Hakulinen - Metso Power Oy, Kurt Siren - Oy
furnace. Typical additional flows to the furnace are: the combustion Keskuslaboratorio-Centrallaboratorium AB, Juha Koskiniemi - Andritz
of weak non condensable gases (DNCG or HVLC NCG), the Oy, Mika Salo - Oy Metsä-Botnia Ab, Jyrki Rautkorpi - Jaakko Pöyry
combustion of strong non condensable gases (CNCG or LVHC NCG), Oy, Mikko Hupa - Åbo Akademi. Secretary for the subcommittee was
the combustion of dissolving tank vent gases, and the combustion of Jens Kohlmann - Jaakko Pöyry Oy. Several helpful comments were
methanol and turpentine. In addition to the above, with black liquor received from members that facilitated the creation of the document.
other streams are burned, makeup, waste acids, biosludge and soap. We especially want to extend our gratitude to Rainer Backman,
Because the balances are based on the as-fired liquor, all the Umeå University and Saied Kochesfahani, US Borax Inc., who helped
streams added to the virgin black liquor are automatically included. It to improve the accuracy of thermodynamical data for borates.
References
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