Reliable Monitoring Ensures Complete Combustion : Thermography Cameras from HGH Boost Efficiency at Waste to Energy Plants
HGH’s thermography cameras support consistent and reliable monitoring of the incineration process to ensure complete combustion of all organic material contained in waste.
Most waste-to-energy plants burn municipal solid waste to produce steam in a boiler, which is used to generate electricity and provide heat to households and commercial buildings. These plants operate 24 hours a day, all year long, supplying reliable base-load energy to the connected networks. Considering what is at stake, modern waste-to-energy plants are designed to ensure proper combustion and reduce emission rate while maintaining the highest level of availability.
Key challenges of the incineration process
To be able to burn very solid materials, incinerators must reach a temperature which is usually between 850°C and more than 1100°C. This temperature and its distribution inside the furnace must be controlled among others for the following reasons:
- to avoid the creation of hot spots where concentrated heat might damage the grate or the walls of the furnace;
- to ensure that heat is released at the proper location to be efficiently collected and transferred to the boiler;
- to make sure that the combustion is complete and that the slag includes no residual organic materials;
- to keep the operating point of the installation within a range where emissions are limited.
HGH’s proposition for Combustion Visual and Thermal Monitoring
HGH’s high temperature cameras allow easy and accurate viewing of the combustion process in waste incinerators. Designed to operate in extreme conditions through cluttered burning zone environments, they measure the temperature at every pixel in the image enabling operators to adjust continuously the combustion parameters.
Multiple measurement areas can be defined and alarms can be set for each of them; specific tools allow to automatically detect the flame front on the grate.
This is an example of the information which can be used to closely control the process, with the aim of optimizing its performance while minimizing energy consumption and mechanical constraints in the actuators, thus contributing further towards reducing operating and maintenance costs.