Gas turbine efficiency and ramp rate improvement through compressed air injection

With the transition to more use of renewable forms of energy in Europe, grid instability that is linked to the intermittency in power generation is a concern, and thus, the fast response of on-demand power systems like gas turbines has become more important. This study focuses on the injection of compressed air to facilitate the improvement in the ramp-up rate of a heavy-duty gas turbine. The steady-state analysis of compressed airflow injection at part-load and full load indicates power augmentation of up to 25%, without infringing on the surge margin. The surge margin is also seen to be more limiting at part-load with maximum closing of the variable inlet guide vane than at high load with a maximum opening. Nevertheless, the percentage increase in the thermal efficiency of the former is slightly greater for the same amount of airflow injection. Part-load operations above 75% of power show higher thermal efficiencies with airflow injection when compared with other load variation approaches. The quasi-dynamic simulations performed using constant mass flow method show that the heavy-duty gas turbine ramp-up rate can be improved by 10% on average, for every 2% of compressor outlet airflow injected during ramp-up irrespective of the starting load. It also shows that the limitation of the ramp-up rate improvement is dominated by the rear stages and at lower variable inlet guide vane openings. The turbine entry temperature is found to be another restrictive factor at a high injection rate of up to 10%. However, the 2% injection rate is shown to be the safest, also offering considerable performance enhancements. It was also found that the ramp-up rate with air injection from the minimum environmental load to full load amounted to lower total fuel consumption than the design case.