Steady State Thermal Analysis of Gas Turbine Power Plant Cycles at Higher Temperatures

Increasing the cost of fuels, growing concern of global warming and increasing demand of electrical energy, a compact, less polluting and efficient gas turbine power plant with regenerator and a suitable Waste Heat Recovery Steam Generator (WHRSG) presents a very attractive concept. Developments in metallurgical sciences, protective coatings and cooling methods have provided the options to design the components and a higher Turbine Inlet Temperature (TIT) may be achievable in near future. A design and analysis methodology for thermodynamic evaluation of the gas turbine cycles has been developed, validated and applied for the analysis. The analysis reveals that a higher TIT (1900K) is possible to achieve higher performance (70% first law efficiency and 55% second law efficiency) with lower fuel consumptions and pressure ratio (20).