The Taichung Power Plant () is a coal-fired power plant in Longjing,

Taichung Taichung (, Wade–Giles: ''Tʻai²-chung¹'', pinyin: ''Táizhōng''), officially Taichung City, is a special municipality located in central Taiwan. Taichung has approximately 2.8 million residents and is the second most populous city of Taiw ...

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...

(ROC). With an installed coal-fired generation capacity of 5,500 MW, it is the fourth largest coal-fired power station in the world. Together with its gas-fired and wind generation units, the total installed capacity of the plant is 5,824 MW. In November 2017, the Taichung city government ordered that the Taichung Power Plant reduce its coal consumption by 24% starting in January 2018. The plant is estimated to have been one of the ten most carbon polluting coal-fired power plants in the world in 2018, at 29.9 million tons of

carbon dioxide Carbon dioxide (chemical formula ) is a chemical compound made up of molecules that each have one carbon atom covalently double bonded to two oxygen atoms. It is found in the gas state at room temperature. In the air, carbon dioxide is transpar ...

, and relative emissions are estimated at 1.282 kg per

kWh A kilowatt-hour (unit symbol: kW⋅h or kW h; commonly written as kWh) is a unit of energy: one kilowatt of power for one hour. In terms of SI derived units with special names, it equals 3.6 megajoules (MJ). Kilowatt-hours are a common bil ...

Generation units

The power plant consists of ten coal-fired units with nominal capacity of 550 MW each. Four original units were commissioned in 1991 and 1992. In 1996–1997, four additional units were added. The eight older units have a total estimated coal requirement of around 12 million tonnes of bituminous and 2.5 million tonnes of

sub-bituminous Sub-bituminous coal is a lower grade of coal that contains 35–45% carbon. The properties of this type are between those of lignite, the lowest grade of coal, and those of bituminous coal, the second-highest grade of coal. Sub-bituminous coal i ...

coal a year. In August 2005 and June 2006, 550 MW sub- critical pressure units 9 and 10 were installed on the adjacent land reclaimed by depositing ash. In addition to ten coal-fired steam turbines, Taichung Power Plant has another 4

gas turbines A gas turbine, also called a combustion turbine, is a type of continuous flow internal combustion engine. The main parts common to all gas turbine engines form the power-producing part (known as the gas generator or core) and are, in the directi ...

and 22 wind turbines which add another 280 MW and 44 MW additional capacity respectively.

Components

The plant has a complex conveyor system. There are three belts from the harbour which bring the coal into the plant via six ship unloaders, two bucket type and four screw type. The coal is either directed straight to a unit or stacked in the coal yard by five stacker/reclaimers. The coal can be reclaimed from here and sent to any of the 10 units. There is built in redundancy in the critical conveyor paths. All of the belts are equipped with

fire detection system A fire alarm system warns people when smoke, fire, carbon monoxide or other fire-related or general notification emergency, emergencies are detected. These alarms may be activated automatically from smoke detectors and heat detectors or may also ...

to monitor the temperature along the belt and to send alarms in the case of fire to minimize damage. The coal receiving facilities were completed in 1992. The

boiler A boiler is a closed vessel in which fluid (generally water) is heated. The fluid does not necessarily boil. The heated or vaporized fluid exits the boiler for use in various processes or heating applications, including water heating, central h ...

for each unit is drum type, water-cooled, naturally circulated with dry bottom furnace, balance draft and coal and oil-fired capability. The

steam turbine A steam turbine is a machine that extracts thermal energy from pressurized steam and uses it to do mechanical work on a rotating output shaft. Its modern manifestation was invented by Charles Parsons in 1884. Fabrication of a modern steam turbin ...

for each unit is a tandem-compound with four flow exhaust, single reheat and 550 MW rated capacity. The

generator Generator may refer to: * Signal generator, electronic devices that generate repeating or non-repeating electronic signals * Electric generator, a device that converts mechanical energy to electrical energy. * Generator (circuit theory), an eleme ...

s are supercritical steam high power density. The electrostatic precipitator removes 99.8% of the particulates and classifies them for industrial

cement A cement is a binder, a chemical substance used for construction that sets, hardens, and adheres to other materials to bind them together. Cement is seldom used on its own, but rather to bind sand and gravel ( aggregate) together. Cement mix ...

and

land reclamation Land reclamation, usually known as reclamation, and also known as land fill (not to be confused with a waste landfill), is the process of creating new land from oceans, seas, riverbeds or lake beds. The land reclaimed is known as reclamati ...

. The power plant is connected to the grid via a 345 kV switchyard.

Function

The power plant is designed for

base load The base load (also baseload) is the minimum level of demand on an electrical grid over a span of time, for example, one week. This demand can be met by unvarying power plants, dispatchable generation, or by a collection of smaller intermittent en ...

service and is able for daily startup and shutdown operation. The plant's electricity is being sold to Taipower under a 25-year power purchase agreement. TaichungPowerStation-Taiwan01

Fuel supply

The power plant uses 12 million tons of bituminous and 2.5 million tons of sub-bituminous coal a year. Taipower buys most of the plant coal supply through long-term contracts from

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...

and other sources. Indonesia is the prime source for the sub-bituminous coal. The remainder of its coal supply is purchased on the spot market.

Pollution

During warnings by the scientific community about increasing prevalence of lung cancer in Taiwan in December 2015, it was claimed that Taichung Power Plant along with the Sixth Naphtha Cracking Plant of the Formosa Plastics Group account for roughly seventy percent of the air pollution in the Central Taiwan region of the country, emitting large quantities of sulfur oxides.

Future expansion

There is an expansion plan to build two new 800 MW units by 2016.

Events

2017

On 4 August 2017, unit 7 generator of the plant tripped at 9:25 a.m. due to low vacuum in its

steam condenser A surface condenser is a water-cooled shell and tube heat exchanger installed to condense exhaust steam from a steam turbine in thermal power stations. These Condenser (heat transfer), condensers are heat exchangers which convert steam from its g ...

system which triggered the safety protection system. The event caused a power reduction of 500 MW but it was quickly restored and restarted at 12:35 p.m. On 5 August 2017, unit 1 generator of the plant malfunctioned due to a broken

pipe which led to the reduction of 530 MW power generation.

2021

On 10 June 2021, a fire broke out at the coal conveyor belt of the plant. It started at 7:03 a.m. and managed to be extinguished 3 hours later.

Awards

On 8 November 2010, the power plant won the outstanding award at the 23rd National QCC Competition, organized by Industrial Development Bureau of the Ministry of Economic Affairs.

Transportation

Taichung Power Plant is accessible West from Longjing Station of the Taiwan Railways.

References

{{Power plants of Taiwan 1992 establishments in Taiwan Buildings and structures in Taichung Coal-fired power stations in Taiwan