Layouts of trigeneration plants for centralized power supply

One of the possible and, under certain conditions, sufficiently effective methods for reducing consumption of fuel and energy resources is the development of plants for combined generation of different kinds of energy. In the power industry of Russia, the facilities have become widespread in which the cogeneration technology, i.e., simultaneous generation of electric energy and heat, is implemented. Such facilities can use different plants, viz., gas- and steam-turbine plants and gas-reciprocating units. Cogeneration power supply can be further developed by simultaneously supplying the users not only with electricity and heat but also with cold. Such a technology is referred to as trigeneration. To produce electricity and heat, trigeneration plants can use the same facilities that are used in cogeneration, namely, gas-turbine plants, steam-turbine plants, and gas-reciprocating units. Cold can be produced in trigeneration plants using thermotransformers of various kinds, such as vaporcompression thermotransformers, air thermotransformers, and absorption thermotransformers, that operate as chilling machines. The thermotransformers can also be used in the trigeneration plants to generate heat. The main advantage of trigeneration plants based on gas-turbine plants or gas-reciprocating units over cogeneration plants is the increased thermodynamic power supply efficiency owing to utilization of the waste-gas heat not only in winter but also in summer. In the steam-turbine-based trigeneration plants equipped with absorption thermotransformers, the enhancement of the thermodynamic power supply efficiency is determined by the increase in the heat extraction load during the nonheating season. The article presents calculated results that demonstrate higher thermodynamic efficiency of a gas-turbine-based plant with an absorption thermotransformer that operates in the trigeneration mode compared with a cogeneration gas-turbine plant. The structural arrangements of trigeneration plants designed to supply electricity, heat, and cold to the users are shown and the principles of their operation are described. The article presents results of qualitative analysis of different engineering solutions applied to select one combination of power- and heat-generating equipment and thermotransformers or another.