HEAT

EXCHANGERS
 TYPES OF HEAT EXCHANGERS
• SUPERHEATER
• REHEATER
• ECONOMISER
• AIR PREHEATER
• CONDENSER
• FEED WATER HEATER
• REGENERATIVE HEAT EXCHANGER
 SUPERHEATER
A superheater is a device used to convert saturated steam or wet steam into dry steam used in steam
engines or in processes, such as steam reforming. There are three types of superheaters namely: radiant,
convection, and separately fired. A superheater can vary in size from a few tens of feet to several hundred
feet (a few metres or some hundred metres).
TYPES
1. A radiant superheater is placed directly in the combustion chamber.
2. A convection superheater is located in the path of the hot gases.
3. A separately fired superheater, as its name implies, is totally separated from the boiler.

ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES

1. The main advantages of using a superheater are reduced fuel and water consumption but there is a
price to pay in increased maintenance costs. In most cases the benefits outweighed the costs and
superheaters were widely used.
2. Without careful maintenance superheaters are prone to a particular type of hazardous failure in the
tube bursting at the U-shaped turns in the superheater tube. This is difficult to both manufacture,
and test when installed, and a rupture will cause the superheated high-pressure steam to escape
immediately into the large flues, then back to the fire and outside, causing extreme danger to the
workers.
 REHEATER
• Power plant furnaces may have a reheater section containing tubes
heated by hot flue gases outside the tubes. Exhaust steam from the
high pressure turbine is rerouted to go inside the reheater tubes to
pickup more energy to go drive intermediate or lower pressure
turbines.
 ECONOMIZER
• In boilers, economizers are heat exchange devices that heat fluids, usually water, up to but not normally
beyond the boiling point of that fluid. Economizers are so named because they can make use of the enthalpy
in fluid streams that are hot, but not hot enough to be used in a boiler, thereby recovering more useful
enthalpy and improving the boiler's efficiency. They are a device fitted to a boiler which saves energy by using
the exhaust gases from the boiler to preheat the cold water used to fill it (the feed water).
• The boiler room is a huge energy guzzler. It consists of thermal fluid boilers or steam boiler, with exhaust
gases through a common chimney. An indirect contact or contact condensing economizer will recover the
residual heat from the combustion products. A series of dampers, an efficient control system, as well as a
ventilator, allow all or part of the combustion products to pass through the economizer, depending on the
demand for make-up water and/or process water. The temperature of the gases can be lowered from 200°C
to 10°C, while preheating the process water from 8°C to 80°C. On average over the year, boiler combustion
efficiency has risen from 80% to more than 95%. The efficiency of heat produced is directly linked to boiler
efficiency. The percentage of excess air and the temperature of the combustion products are two key
variables in evaluating this efficiency.
• It is located below the LPSH in the boiler and above pre heater. It is there to improve the efficiency of boiler
by extracting heat from flue gases to heat water and send it to boiler drum.
• Advantages of Economiser include
• 1) Fuel economy: – used to save fuel and increase overall efficiency of boiler plant.
• 2) Reducing size of boiler: – as the feed water is preheated in the economiser and enter boiler tube at
elevated temperature. The heat transfer area required for evaporation reduced considerably.
 AIR PREHEATER
• An air preheater (APH) is a general term to describe any device designed to heat air before another
process (for example, combustion in a boiler) with the primary objective of increasing the thermal
efficiency of the process.
• The purpose of the air preheater is to recover the heat from the boiler flue gas which increases the
thermal efficiency of the boiler by reducing the useful heat lost in the flue gas. As a consequence, the
flue gases are also conveyed to the flue gas stack (or chimney) at a lower temperature, allowing
simplified design of the conveyance system and the flue gas stack. It also allows control over the
temperature of gases leaving the stack (to meet emissions regulations, for example).
Types
• There are two types of air preheaters for use in steam generators in thermal power stations: One is a
tubular type built into the boiler flue gas ducting, and the other is a regenerative air preheater. These
may be arranged so the gas flows horizontally or vertically across the axis of rotation.
• Another type of air preheater is the regenerator used in iron or glass manufacture.
 CONDENSER
• The condenser condenses the steam from the exhaust of the turbine into liquid to allow it to be
pumped. If the condenser can be made cooler, the pressure of the exhaust steam is reduced and
efficiency of the cycle increases. The surface condenser is a shell and tube heat exchanger in
which cooling water is circulated through the tubes. The exhaust steam from the low pressure
turbine enters the shell where it is cooled and converted to condensate (water) by flowing over
the tubes.
• For best efficiency, the temperature in the condenser must be kept as low as practical in order to
achieve the lowest possible pressure in the condensing steam. The heat absorbed by the
circulating cooling water in the condenser tubes must also be removed to maintain the ability of
the water to cool as it circulates. This is done by pumping the warm water from the condenser
through either natural draft, forced draft or induced draft cooling tower that reduce the
temperature of the water by evaporation, by about 11 to 17 °C —expelling waste heat to the
atmosphere. The condenser tubes are made of brass or stainless steel to resist corrosion from
either side.
• The functions of a condenser are:-
1. To provide lowest economic heat rejection temperature for steam.
2. To convert exhaust steam to water for reserve thus saving on feed water requirement.
3. To introduce make up water.
• We normally use surface condenser although there is one direct contact condenser as well. In
direct contact type exhaust steam is mixed with directly with cooling water.
 FEED WATER HEATER
• A feedwater heater is a power plant component used to pre-heat water delivered to a steam generating boiler.
Preheating the feedwater reduces the irreversibilities involved in steam generation and therefore improves the
thermodynamic efficiency of the system. This reduces plant operating costs and also helps to avoid thermal shock
to the boiler metal when the feedwater is introduced back into the steam cycle.
• In a steam power plant (usually modelled as a modified Rankine cycle), feedwater heaters allow the feedwater to
be brought up to the saturation temperature very gradually. This minimizes the inevitable irreversibilities
associated with heat transfer to the working fluid (water). The energy used to heat the feedwater is usually derived
from steam extracted between the stages of the steam turbine.
• Feedwater heaters can also be "open" or "closed"  heat exchangers.
• An open heat exchanger is one in which extracted steam is allowed to mix with the feedwater. This kind of heater
will normally require a feed pump at both the feed inlet and outlet since the pressure in the heater is between the
boiler pressure and the condenser pressure. A deaerator is a special case of the open feedwater heater which is
specifically designed to remove non-condensable gases from the feedwater.
• Closed feedwater heaters are typically shell and tube heat exchangers where the feedwater passes throughout the
tubes and is heated by turbine extraction steam. These do not require separate pumps before and after the heater
to boost the feedwater to the pressure of the extracted steam as with an open heater. However, the extracted
steam (which is most likely almost fully condensed after heating the feedwater) must then be throttled to the
condenser pressure, an isenthalpic process that results in some entropy gain with a slight penalty on overall cycle
efficiency.
• Many power plants incorporate a number of feedwater heaters and may use both open and closed components.
Feedwater heaters are used in both fossil- and nuclear-fuelled power plants.
 REGENERATIVE HEAT EXCHANGER
• A regenerative heat exchanger, or more commonly a regenerator, is a type of heat exchanger
where heat from the hot fluid is intermittently stored in a thermal storage medium before it is
transferred to the cold fluid. To accomplish this the hot fluid is brought into contact with the heat
storage medium, then the fluid is displaced with the cold fluid, which absorbs the heat.
• In regenerative heat exchangers, the fluid on either side of the heat exchanger can be the same
fluid. The fluid may go through an external processing step, and then it is flowed back through the
heat exchanger in the opposite direction for further processing. Usually the application will use
this process cyclically or repetitively.
• Regenerative heating was one of the most important technologies developed during the
Industrial Revolution when it was used in the hot blast process on blast furnaces. It was later used
in glass and steel making, in high pressure boilers and chemical and other applications, where it
continues to be important today.
THE END