Steam Accumulators
Like any other machine, boiler manufacturing has also undergone a sea-change in the last century. Today’s boilers are much more efficient than the boiler so past as there has been constant pressure on designers to make these more and more energy efficient.
The ever-increasing competition has forced the boiler users to turn to non-conventional fuels, which in turn has resulted in compact boilers to suit the demands. Today the boilers have been reduced in size as higher efficiency and quick response is the demand of the day. Compact designs are preferred so as to have the lesser footprint and initial costs have also reduced as the buyers need cheaper options. However, to meet these demands, one important aspect of boiler design has been compromised i.e. water & steam holding space.
The actual energy gets stored in a boiler in form of water it holds as saturation temperature. Greater the amount of water holding volume in a boiler, greater is the energy stored which is required to answer surge demands or high instantaneous steam loads.A typical comparison between modern-day packaged boiler and old model Lancashire boiler of similar capacities is mentioned below:
The ever-increasing competition has forced the boiler users to turn to non-conventional fuels, which in turn has resulted in compact boilers to suit the demands. Today the boilers have been reduced in size as higher efficiency and quick response is the demand of the day. Compact designs are preferred so as to have the lesser footprint and initial costs have also reduced as the buyers need cheaper options. However, to meet these demands, one important aspect of boiler design has been compromised i.e. water & steam holding space.
The actual energy gets stored in a boiler in form of water it holds as saturation temperature. Greater the amount of water holding volume in a boiler, greater is the energy stored which is required to answer surge demands or high instantaneous steam loads.A typical comparison between modern-day packaged boiler and old model Lancashire boiler of similar capacities is mentioned below:
Boiler Type
|
Steaming capacity
|
Volumetric capacity
|
Lancashire boiler
|
2000 Kg/hr
|
27000 litters
|
Packaged boiler
|
2000 Kg/hr
|
5000 litters
|
The modern packaged boiler contains only 20% of the water held in a similar capacity Lancashire boiler, which means that the energy stored in this is only 1/5th of the energy stored in the Lancashire boiler. Hence a modern packaged boiler would not be able to meet the sudden surge in steam demands from the process as an old boiler could.
The Steam demands on any process industry are never steady, it keeps on fluctuating during the day. Usually, industries which work in batch processes are the ones where there are crests and troughs in steam demands like Laminates, dandified plywood, Metal Forging, Thermocole etc.
Due to this peak demand, the pressure inside the boiler falls immediately, thereby causing loss of production due to increase in process time. Other negative results are low boiler efficiency and reduced boiler life. To counter this sudden demand, the process industry managers use the staggering technique wherein they stagger the production processes to keep steam demands under control. But this results in lower production, which is detrimental to the overall health of the process industry.  |
| Steam Accumulators |
Also Read: What are Steam Boilers?
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