Coal fired gas turbine?

[steve]

This in an idea that I have been playing around with for awhile and I think has a lot of potential, especially because there is an almost unlimited supply of coal available when compared to Oil. (a great deal of which is in Australia, not the middle east, and any chance to reduce our dependency on them is good in my opinion)

Basicly it would operate just like any other gas turbine but the main diference would be the combustion chamber which would have to be quite large.(I'm imagining a CC made from a 55 gallon drum when used with the compressor/turbine from a car turbocharger) Obviously it is not going to be used to propel aircraft, but would be perfect for stationary power generation.

While I will admit that my understanding of turbines is limited, I don't see any reason that this could not be made to work.

comments questions etc are welcome and encouraged as allways!

[pezman]

There are coal gassifiers that are used for power generation. Basically, they make synthetic gas using the coal and then use this to power a turbine. In addition to driving a gas turbine, current designs generally also use the heat of the GT exhaust to heat water for a steam turbine -- a setup known as a combined cycle generator.

Not sure why they don't use the coal directly. My guess is that particulate would shorten the life of the turbine and there are probably emmissions challenges - most of the coal gassification power generation projects in the U.S. are funded under federal "clean coal technology".

[Viv]

There are wood waste bio fueled gas turbine generators up to the 5 megawatt scale.

Viv

[Stephen H]

why turbine? go straight for the valveless? reynst??

[skyfrog]

Why not using steam turbine ?

[steve]

WOW
the wood burning turbine is almost exactly what I had in mind!

I am happy to see that something I conceived could work so well, but at the same time a little dissapointed that someone already built it.

[Lugebob]

How about Christmas tree fired..... I just lit mine in the yards as a demo for the kids to see how fast it burns and it was damn near explosive...

bob

[Mark]

With all the large pine stumps I have, fresh and green and toppled by the hurricane, they exuded sap and it hardens on the the flat cut chainsawed surface into a white and clear mottled wax gel. If you light it, it burns like a bat out of hell, you wouldn't think sap would burn so energetically, but it does, snapping and roiling red flames and fire easily 4 feet above the stump and black smoke billows above that.
Pine sap burns quite well. And the stump I have drilled/bored a hole in for for a pipe to hold my snorkeler upright, just keeps producing sap. I have lit the sap several times now and it still reforms, I guess the massive roots keep pumping it up to the cut surface.
On a similar note, if you take some turpentine and eye-dropper it into a flask containing chlorine gas, it flat out ignites, (bursts into flames). I remember doing this experiment several years ago. It's kind of interesting to see.
Mark