Search Results for: boiler

(January 2022) A Multi-Lesson Hydronics War Story

Learn more about (January 2022) A Multi-Lesson Hydronics War Story at ashrae.org

Avoiding Boiler Problems

Journal

Boilers represent large capital expenditures. Their operational reliability and availability are often critical to facility profitability. Therefore, training and developing personnel responsible for this equipment is essential. Failure to follow a few well-established practices can result in catastrophe. The most common causes of catastrophic boiler failure include: fuel explosion, low water incident, poor water treatment, contaminated feedwater, improper blowdown techniques, improper warm-up, impact damage to tubes, severe overfiring, improper storage, and pulling a vacuum.

Boiler System Efficiency

Journal

When natural gas cost $0.40 per therm* (1999), even a poorly designed boiler system would have positive payback. Hurricane Katrina changed that. According to the Energy Information Administration (www.iea.doe.gov), the cost of natural gas has increased 50% in the U.S. since last fall (due to Hurricane Katrina) and 200% in the last seven years. Electricity has increased only 20% in the same time frame (central Indiana). Winter 2006 natural gas cost as much as $1.40 per therm (100,000 Btu) and electricity costs around $0.07/kWh (3,413 Btu). The electric cost equates to $2.05 per therm.

Understanding Fuel Savings in the Boiler Room

Journal

As oil prices hit record price levels, building owners and facility managers seek to better understand boiler efficiency and how to save on fuel costs. When operated at a 25% capacity factor, a boiler annually consumes four times of its capital cost in energy. Burner and combustion control retrofits offer owners the quickest paybacks based on energy savings. This article explains how to better understand the effect of burner and controls performance on efficiency, boiler heat losses, and saving fuel with multiple boiler plants.

Dual, dissimilar boiler flame safety controls

Journal

Describes how a building management agency operating multiple plants in new Jersey resolved a boiler plant staffing problem for 34 low-pressure steam fire-tube boilers ranging from 2,453 kW to 4,905 kW (250 to 500 boiler hp) by implementing an approved programme for operation, monitoring and documentation for 14 boiler plants. The boilers were retrofitted with a dual, dissimilar flame safeguard control system with remote monitoring and a dissimilar low-water cut off on each boiler. Describes the systems, their installation and remote monitoring system. Notes their satisfactory operation and a payback period of less than one year.

Engineers Notebook: Design Tips to Avoid Boiler Short-Cycling

Journal

Boiler short-cycling causes excessive wear and tear on the boiler and has a tremendous penalty on boiler efficiency. Kent provides tips to help designers improve heating hot water system performance.

A Primer on Protecting Idle Boilers

Journal

Many boiler plants have excess boiler capacity. Typical boiler plants maintain backup capacity that must be instantly ready to provide steam should a mechanical problem occur on the primary boilers. Some boiler plants may have had a greater steam demand at one time, and process changes have reduced present steam requirements. The challenge to many managers is to protect the integrity of this equipment while the boilers are not being used. A significant amount of damage that occurs to boilers during their lifetime can be associated with idle periods and extended downtime. The typical processes in place that provide protection for boilers from scale and corrosion during operational times may not be available when the boiler is not running.

Five Design Factors to Help Optimize a Boiler Plant

Journal

Engineers designing boiler plants need heat and hot water solutions that save installation time, lower construction costs and deliver superior performance. This article discusses five factors to consider: the plant’s function, piping design, boiler selection, boiler controller and remote access.

Examining Boiler Setpoint Effect

Journal

Conventional wisdom says boilers exhibit a setpoint effect due to short cycling, which results in lower seasonal boiler efficiency during seasons when the system load is lower. This article introduces and examines seasonal boiler efficiency (setpoint effect) and the effect of short cycling on boilers.

1999 ASHRAE Technology Awards: Boiler plant replacement reduces steam costs 35%

Journal

The purpose of this retrofit project was to replace the existing central steam boiler plant serving a 6 by 10 million ft2 (557 by 10 000 m2) semiconductor manufacturing complex in Dallas. Building code compliance and expansion of water-chilling capacity at the central utility plant required relocating the existing steam boilers into a separate room, but the age and condition of the existing steam boilers warranted their replacement. As a result, a modernization project was undertaken to construct a separate boiler room and install new, high-efficiency, low-emission replacement steam boilers.