Sub-critical Steam Plants

[mensreaMC]

INTRO

This article covers sub-critical steam plants, which burn a fuel of sorts to generate steam, which in turn is channelled into a turbine chamber and used to spin up generators. The boiler system is designed to enable players to deploy realistic fuel based power stations. The systems for sub-critical plants are designed to function by actually boiling water and channelling the steam through a turbine. Sub-critical steam plants are much less capital intensive to construct than supercritical and overall can use a wider range of materials. They will heat up faster and are also capable of burning less energy dense forms of matter to generate power. However, due to a less sophisticated design the plant overall will generate less electricity than its super-critical progeny. However, the sub-critical plant is also flexible enough to incorporate its historical equivalents; bronze, brass and iron models from the dawn of the industrial revolution.

The sub-critical steam plant, super-critical steam plant, gas turbine plant, and co-generation plant are all based off the same designs but still have their own unique traits that gives them all a purpose IRL and hopefully in game.

DETAILS

I.the sub-critical steam plant can be powered by many different fuels which in turn have different energy ratings -efficiency range is from 30-40% -values are derived from the HHV in the fuel appendix

A.light sweet crude 1.1 barrel of light sweet crude is worth 510.6 kwh

B.natural gas 1.1 tank of natural gas is worth 86.4 kwh

C.propane 1.1 tank of propane is worth 223.2 kwh

D.biogas 1.1 tank of biogas is worth 64.8 kwh

E.coal 1.1 unit of coal is worth 30.6 kwh a.every 10 pieces of coal burned results in 1 unit of fly-ash being deposited in the output slot

F.biomass 1.1 log is worth 22.8 kwh a.every log burned results in one unit of ash being deposited in the output slot 2.10 units of hemp/switchgrass/sugarcane would provide 21.2 kwh a.every 10 units of hemp/switchgrass/sugarcane burned results in one unit of ash being deposited in the output slot

G.waste 1.1 unit of waste is worth 5.5 kwh a.every unit of waste burned results in one unit of fly ash being deposited in the output slot

H.hydrogen 1.1 tank is worth 128.1 kwh

I.kerosene 1.1 barrel is worth 494.4 kwh

J.ethanol 1.1 barrel is worth 312 kwh

II.the plants are made up of the following blocks

A.[fuel name] fuelled sub-critical control block -plant will only burn the fuel it was designed for but fuels of an identical state of matter (gas, liquid, solid) should be able to be swapped in a trivial crafting reaction -example: the player picks their Natural gas fuelled sub-critical control block up from the workshop. they need it to be fuelled by propane though, so they place it in a crafting grid and the output is a Propane fuelled sub-critical control block. if they were to place it in the crafting grid again the output would be a Biogas fuelled sub-critical control block, then crafting the Biogas fuelled sub-crit would take them back to the Natural gas fuelled sub-crit. the same could be done with coal, biomass and waste fuelled sub-crits.

1.scans for biome

2.Scans large area (50x50x20) when placed for turbine chamber blocks, generator blocks, component blocks, mechanism blocks, motor blocks, condenser blocks and pipe blocks and then determines if it has what it needs to function based off the number and/or rating of the turbine chamber blocks a.generator block(s) and turbine chamber block(s) ratings must match -example: the user tries to pair a turbine rated for 1000 kw with a 2 mw generator. the ratings do not match so the combo does not work. they must either use a 2 mw turbine and 2 mw generator or a 1000 kw turbine and 1000 kw generator -example: the user tries to pair a turbine rated for 1000 kw with 2 500 kw generators. the ratings do not match the combo does not work. they must either use two 500 kw turbines and two 500 kw generators or a 1000 kw turbine and 1000 kw generator -if the turbine chambers and component blocks are iron grade or better then the plant gets a 6% efficiency bonus to electricity output -if the turbine chambers and component blocks are steel grade or better then the plant gets a 10% efficiency bonus to electricity output b.For each turbine chamber there must be 4 component blocks -if the turbine chamber block is rated less than 1000 kw only 2 component blocks are needed -if the turbine chamber block is rated less than 500 kw only 1 component block is needed c.for each turbine chamber there must be 1 mechanism block -if the turbine chamber block is rated less than 1000 kw no mechanism block is needed d.for each turbine chamber there must be 1 motor of at least 100kw -five 2 mw turbine chamber blocks will accept 1 motor block rated 500 -ten 2 mw turbine chamber blocks will accept 1 motor block rated 1000 -twenty 2 mw turbine chamber blocks will accept 1 motor block rated 2 mw e.For each turbine chamber there must be 4 condensers -double the number of condensers for hot biomes, halve the number of condensers for cold biomes f.For each turbine chamber there must be 4 pipes

3.turbine block max rating(s) determine how much energy the plant can possibly produce a.plant will ideally only use as much fuel as its able to effectively utilize (though some waste will happen due to uneven and fractional numbers). otherwise the onus of rationing the correct amount of fuel to prevent waste will fall on the user -example: 100 2 mw turbine/generator block pairs (with a collective max output rating of 200 mw) could effectively utilize up to 100 stacks of coal; burning more than 100 stacks would produce more steam than the plant could efficiently turn into electricity and so would be a waste (this example is from the super-crit article but the idea is the same)

4.Scans large area (50x50x20) when activated by redstone or after a successful burn cycle for the same conditions it scanned for when initially placed a.if the conditions are not met then the block does not initiate a burn cycle

5.Features large input and output grids (10x10? more?) for fuels and empty tanks/barrels/ash/fly ash a.Alternatively, features a large internal tank for holding liquid and gaseous fuels, so the player can hold filled barrels/tanks, right click the control block and thus load it with said fuels while the empty barrels/tanks are returned b.Could be connected to a hopper to auto-feed fuel in the top and a chute on the bottom to get rid of empty barrels/tanks/ash/fly ash

6.Fuels are burned in batches for one hour, then another batch is accepted a.plant must be activated initially by supplying a redstone signal to the control block. after initial activation the plant will run until its out of fuel. this makes it so fuel can be burned in batches, otherwise it would automatically burn any fuel the user placed in its input and potentially have to keep track of way too many things at once -example: the player loads 100 stacks of coal into the control block and 30 stacks is the max it can actually use so it only burns 30 stacks over the course of an hour. during this time the control block will output 200 mw every second (in this instance). once its burned up another 30 stacks would be loaded and burned until all the coal was used up, at which point it would have to be reloaded with coal and provided a redstone signal to initiate it

7.Features a "heat up" % readout, after running 2 times at the plants max rated capacity it will be at 100%. anything less than 100% cuts down on the total output of the plant by the difference (if its 50% heated then there will be a 50% loss of electricity production) -or running 4 times at half rated max capacity -or running 8 times at quarter rated max capacity a.loses 1% every 10 minutes when not being used b.heats up twice as fast in hot biomes, loses heat twice as fast in cold biomes

B.Turbine chamber block 1.brass, steel, stainless steel, tool steel, titanium

C.Generator block

D.Component block 1.copper, bronze, brass, steel, stainless steel, tool steel, titanium, tungsten

E.Mechanism block 1.bronze, brass, steel, stainless steel, tool steel, titanium, tungsten

F.Motor block 1.rated at least 100 kw

G.Condenser block

H.Pipe block 1.any metal

IDEAS

-give machine blocks different meta numbers if they are placed next to a certain block. control blocks then look for not just the block but a block with a certain meta number. this way somewhat logical machine arrangements could be enforced. for example component blocks must be placed together and have a pipe connected to them, which then connects to another pipe or a turbine chamber. the system could be arranged without cumbersome constant updates and associated lag problems but it would be yet another programming and design hurdle -pollution system that inhibits or hurts plant growth in an area around the power plant. also could prevent players from running (asthma!). -establish realistic motor requirements based off how much plants of various capacities actually use water and/or compressed air and how much power would be needed to pump and/or compress it through the system. possibly incorporate some kind of constant water requirement? -add single block generators that produce laughable amounts of energy (1-50 kw range)? most sources of fuel even at the pound, gallon or cubic foot level can produce more energy than that. possibly a very simple, primitive generator that works off small amounts of biomass or single pieces of coal/charcoal?

[mensreaMC]

REVISION 1 -added figures for propane, biomass, waste and biogas -added pipe requirement -made metal requirements looser to offer players a historically accurate portrayal of the development of steam power and its use to generate electricity

[mensreaMC]

REVISION 2 -overhauled the article for cohesion and interpretations sake -added some more bonuses and generally made things more flexible. this is the first generator players should be building except maybe wind (and later hopefully run of the river hydro) -added motor requirements: these plants need motors to operate water pumps and things like fans to aerosolize coal dust, but the figures are arbitrary because I have no idea how much power stuff like that actually uses -added ideas section. stuff that could maybe be implemented at sometime. some of it is practical and other stuff is more of a hurdle. the ideas here apply to super-crit, gas turbine and cogeneration as well

[mensreaMC]

REVISION 3 -lowered the % based bonuses

[mensreaMC]

REVISION 4 -changed fuels in accordance with fuel appendix -changed efficiencies and bonuses in accordance with cycle efficiency ranges -reformatted the article and fixed some spelling/grammer/organization mistakes

[mensreaMC]

REVISION 5 -fixed up some things