Armstrong Energy
Gas-fired peakers become
‘cycling’ units in the heart of
baseload coal country
A
visit to every power station experienced a total of 29 starts in 2008, “When we are dispatched, the units
these days elicits a story that while last year the starts increased to run at full output,” Denver said.
doesn’t square with a tradi- just shy of 600. In any case, it’s a stunning mental
tional understanding of the The number this year is expected to picture, a gas-fired GT peaking facil-
electricity industry but makes perfect be even higher. “We’ve been reclas- ity surrounded by large coal units dis-
sense under today’s market conditions. sified as a cycling plant, no longer a patched at the low end of the range
The latest is Armstrong Energy, com- peaker,” he explained, “and typically typical for a combined cycle (Fig 1).
prising four dual-fuel, simple-cycle GE the units run over 10 hours before shut- In fact, the units are dispatched so
7FA.03 gas turbine/generators installed ting down—seven days a week!” In this often, a challenge confronting the plant
in 2002 and five 3-MW engine/genera- case, cycling refers to daily start/stop. is the emissions limits in the operating
tor sets installed last year. All four GTs
have fogging units to boost capacity.
The site is less than 90 minutes
600 8 20
northeast of Pittsburgh, in the heart of
coal country, across the street from the
1700-MW (two unit, coal) Keystone
Capacity factor, %
1000 operating hours
Generating Station, and not far from the 6 15
1700-MW (also two unit, coal) Conem- 400 Starts
Annual starts
augh Power Plant and the 1880-MW
(three unit, coal) Homer City Genera- Capacity factor
tion LP. Also of significance, Armstrong 4 10
is adjacent to a 17-billion-ft³ gas storage
facility, ties in to a 500-kV transmis- 200
sion line half a mile away, and from 2 5
the site you can see several of the gas
wells drawing from what is commonly
known as the Marcellus Shale. Operating hours
Armstrong’s original purpose as a 0 0
2002 2004 2006 2008 2010 2012 2014 2016
peaking facility may be in the rear- Year
view mirror for a long time. Drama-
tizing the shift in “operating tempo,” 1. Armstrong Energy, with four dual-fuel simple-cycle 7FA.03 gas turbine/gen-
Matt Denver, plant manager, pointed erators, was designed as a peaking facility. Today it exhibits annual operating
to a large screen of performance stats hours, capacity factor, and starts characteristic of the low end of a typical gas-
in his office showing that the four units fired combined-cycle range
44 COMBINED CYCLE JOURNAL, Number 50, Third Quarter 2016
Armstrong Energy
2. The accelerated operating tempo has caused Arm- automation system are shown above for the lube-oil sys-
strong staff to bolster continuous M&D capability. Screens tem (top left), cooling water (bottom left), fuel supply (top
custom-built by the plant staff in the Mark VI control and right), and inlet fogging (bottom right)
permit. “We can go to 28.8% capacity aren’t just for testing of the fuel-oil sys- the 7F Users Group steering committee.
factor (CF),” Denver said, “above that, tems, either,” Denver stressed. Armstrong has a contractual services
the owners have to make decisions about Armstrong has been deemed “criti- agreement with the OEM but it is starts-
significant capital investment in emis- cal infrastructure” by PJM (though, based, typical for peakers, he stressed.
sions control, perhaps SCR or DLN 2.6+ importantly, not by NERC), hence the “Today, when something breaks in
mods.” Even in the shoulder months of addition of 15 MW of engine/genera- one unit, we fix it in all the other units
spring and fall, a couple of units are run- tor capacity for black-start capability. as soon as possible,” he added.
ning, with the others in outage. “Our ability to fire fuel oil drove that Intervals between major mainte-
While most of Armstrong’s output is expansion,” Denver explained. nance events have been shortened. “It
sold into the energy market, the plant Under the current vagaries of the seems hot-gas-path (HGP) inspections
also participates in the capacity per- natural-gas market, much Marcellus are coming around the corner all the
formance market. “The penalties are supply is currently “shut in,” meaning time now,” Margliotti said. “We’ve had
huge, so reliability has taken on new it either doesn’t have access to trans- two HGPs with the third and fourth due
meaning.” To be prepared when power mission for delivery to distant markets within the next year. We’ve also done
is critical, PJM goes into what it calls or the prices are too low and demand generator inspections, and we saw no
a “performance assessment hour,” or too scant. As a result, “at times, we can dusting; they were immaculate!”
PAH, and has no obligation to notify the get fuel for under $1.00/million Btu,” Some of the physical modifications
plant that one is coming. “Armstrong said Denver. He added, “our plant is conducted to enhance reliability under
has 15 minutes to start up, close the fed from the suction side of the gas stor- the faster operating tempo include:
breakers, and get its megawatts into age facility across the street.” n Compressor enhancement package
the grid,” Denver said. At that gas price, even simple-cycle (known as Package 3).
According to PJM documents, every machines apparently can displace coal n Bellows modifications.
generating resource must comply with capacity bidding in the market and n Exhaust flex-seal upgrades.
the requirements of its host transmission economically replace older, inefficient n Fire protection system.
operator. “That means with no excuses.” coal capacity being retired. n Fuel-system modifications.
Denver elaborated: “You get bonuses n Improved igniters.
for meeting PAH obligations, which are Maintenance philosophy n Digital generator-protection (DGP)
paid from the penalties charged to the upgrade.
non-performers.” changes n Variable-frequency drives on the
Fuel-oil operating hours for the “Obviously, the maintenance program cooling-water pumps.
Armstrong units are not insignificant. has to be aligned with the new oper- n Fuel-oil valving improvements.
Thirteen percent of the total operating ating regime,” noted Peter Margliotti, One area of significant change is
time has been on oil since 2002. “These gas-turbine specialist and member of in monitoring and diagnostics (M&D).
GRiD, No. 2, Fourth Quarter 2016 45
Editorial Staff
Bob Schwieger, Editor
[email protected]
Kiyo Komoda, Creative Director
Scott Schwieger, Director, Electronic Products
[email protected]
Business Staff
Susie Carahalios, Sales Director
[email protected], 303-697-5009
Editorial Advisory Board
Jason Makansi, Chairman
President, Pearl Street
[email protected]
Ed Barndt
Senior VP, Rockland Capital
Chuck Casey
Utility Generation Manager, City of Riverside
3. Armstrong added five 3-MW engine/generator sets last year in response
Mark Glaess
Utility Strategies Consultant to PJM’s RFP for new black-start units in Western Pennsylvania
Lee Kosla
Saft “We’re monitoring metallurgical creep the 4160-V breakers for all five gen-
Steve Royall of the blades, nozzles, and casing, erator sets and both bus tie breakers.
Director, Power Generation Fossil O&M, and deformation issues as if we had The control room features touchscreen
Pacific Gas & Electric Co combined cycles,” Margliotti noted, HMI that allows safe operation of the
Dave Ulozas “as well as remotely monitor more equipment by being separated from
VP Generation, MidAmerican Energy Co
sub-system parameters— including the high voltage and noise produced
GRiDtoday is published by PSI Media Inc, a Pearl
Street company. Editorial offices: 7628 Belmondo
lube oil, cooling water, atomizing air, by the diesel/generators.
Lane, Las Vegas, Nev 89128. fire protection system, and instrument Addition of the black-start equip-
Telephone: 702-869-4739; fax, 702-869-6867 calibrations.” Margliotti and his team ment completely changed the electrical
To cancel or change your subscription, write
have designed custom screens in the operation of the station. Breakers were
[email protected] Mark VI automation system for this added to the 4160-V busses to allow
purpose (Fig 2). for synchronization with the diesel/
Both Margliotti and Denver credit generators. Protection schemes for the
In this issue: their small, but dedicated staff for the 4160-V breakers had to be changed to
43 Commentary: Paradigm shift— continuing success of the plant in the allow for the new emergency mode of
from “big iron” to the distribution face of dynamic market changes. “We operation. Emergency mode enables
end of the value chain haven’t had a lost-time accident since the selected priority diesel/genera-
inception,” claimed Denver. Five of the tors to start and automatically close
44 Armstrong’s gas-fired peakers seven permanent staff have been at the into the dead 4160-V bus when loss
become “cycling” units in the facility since commissioning. “These of power to the station is detected on
heart of baseload coal country guys and gals are all cross-trained both incoming lines.
through our in-house developed train- Two diesel/generators synchronized
47 Grid-scale storage: Regulators, ing programs, and we manage our own to the 4160-V bus can successfully pick
ISOs set the table; suppliers outages, each GT specialist takes a turn up the load of the entire station with all
served few orders in leading the next outage.” four gas turbines on turning gear. That
49 DG: When the merely viable is important—if the station suffers a
becomes the truly commercial Adapting to PJM’s needs power loss when all four gas turbines
are generating, the diesels can supply
50 Is the plant worth the price? Due Making Armstrong Power a black-start- the needed power to safely return the
diligence ‘gotchas’ capable station was a sizeable task. The four units to turning gear and allow the
project had an impact on many of the rotors to cool correctly.
51 Co-ops and DG: You want it, station’s current systems. Construction of the project was man-
we’ll build it The black-start building houses five aged by GT Specialist Bryan Miller and
52 New practices for resiliency Caterpillar C175-16 (tier 4) diesel/gen- occurred between December 2014 and
erator sets (Fig 3). Each unit can pro- May 2015. The majority of the founda-
55 Riverton repowering offers duce 3 MW of power at 1800 rpm and tion and underground conduit work
decades more life all are fed by a 2300-gal diesel storage was conducted during freezing and
58 Victoria, a 1950s-vintage plant, tank located in the black-start building. inclement weather. Progress was main-
revamped for today’s Ercot market A 2500-gal urea tank is used for the tained by working under a giant inflat-
CEM (clean emissions module) system. able bubble. Extensive excavation was
59 What cost price signals? There is a dual-source air compressor needed for the addition of cable trays,
and dryer system installed to provide air fire protection, and fuel supply lines.
On the cover NV Energy’s 520-MW Silverhawk Gen- to the CEM unit. This avoids being tied The combination of frozen ground and
erating Station sits behind the 20-MW Apex Nevada
Solar project, which supplies power to the utility under into the station instrument air system. natural limestone slabs made excava-
a long-term agreement The motor control center houses tion a serious challenge. GRiD
46 COMBINED CYCLE JOURNAL, Number 50, Third Quarter 2016
