Advanced design, parameter optimization, and thermodynamic analysis of integrated air-blown IGCC power plants

With the increasing energy demand, it is essential to improve the utilization of traditional energy sources. Coal is still the mainstay of the Chinese energy market, especially in power generation. The IGCC offers significant advantages in terms of power efficiency and environmental protection. However, conventional IGCC uses oxygen as the gasification medium, posing serious economic challenges. To address this challenge, in this study, the overall system process for the IGCC systems using air-blown gasification is constructed by Aspen Plus. To explore the potential of the thermal performance of the air-blown gasification IGCC system, the operating parameters and process flows are improved. The energy and exergy analysis of the whole system using the advanced process is carried out and compared with the oxygen gasification IGCC. Optimal operating parameters and technical parameters are determined, and the gasifier is optimized. The results show that the system efficiency increased by 3.17%, and the exergy efficiency increased by 3.09%. Although the integrated gas turbine process does not offer obvious advantages, it is more compatible with the current gas turbine in terms of flow rate. The utilization of a high-pressure reheat gas turbine results in a 2.52% increase in system efficiency. The implementation of highpressure reheat gas turbines and hot gas desulfurization can improve the thermal performance of the system. The air-blown gasification IGCC with this process has the highest power supply efficiency of 52.80%. It presents an improvement of 3.69% compared with oxygen gasification. The exergy loss in the cooling and cleaning module and the gas turbine module is significantly reduced. The heat efficiency of the air-blown gasification IGCC is 3.60% higher, and the effective energy in the system is fully utilized. It provides some heuristic ideas for the clean and efficient utilization of coal resources.