42 HRW / September 2009 www.hydroworld.com
Lessons Learned
Keep That Book!
A hydro utility with more than 1,000
MW of capacity bought an 80-year-old
hydro plant with a capacity of 8 MW. An
inspection of its acquisition revealed the
steel surge tank was severely rusted. The
utility hired a local consultant with small
hydro experience to design a new tank.
The consultant proposed to replace the
Johnson-type differential tank with a
restricted-ori ce surge tank with a di-
ameter about 0.5 meter smaller, which
would be less expensive.
During commissioning of the new
tank, Paul, the plant operator, started
testing of load rejections at 25 percent
generator load. At the second test, for a 50
percent generator load rejection, the surge
tank over owed, to everyone’s surprise.
Paul called George, another consultant,
who obtained the drawings for the new
tank, as well as copies of the plans and
pro les for the old pipeline and penstock.
George determined that the ori ce on
the new surge tank was too large, at 64
percent of the pipeline diameter. For a
restricted-ori ce tank, the rule of thumb
is that the ori ce diameter should be 45 to
55 percent of the pipeline diameter.
Paul asked the consultant to review
the hydraulic design of the new tank.
At the same time, George warned Paul
that with the smaller ori ce diameter, the
penstock pressure rise on load rejection
would be larger. This meant the penstock
waterhammer should be determined with
the new surge tank because it could affect
the design of the penstock.
The consultant had written an Excel
program for the hydraulic design of the
new surge tank, and he had obtained
the discharge coef cient for the ori ce
from a chart. Upon reviewing the chart,
George noticed it was for multi-ori ce
pressure-reducing plates used at in-
dustrial plants, not for a single-ori ce
condition. Based on this feedback, the
consultant increased the discharge co-
ef cient to 0.62 from 0.25 and ran the
program for various ori ce sizes, in the
region of 40 percent to 60 percent of
pipeline diameter. Based on advice from
the consultant, the utility installed an
ori ce with a diameter of 46 percent of
the pipeline diameter. Once this change
was made, commissioning of the surge
tank was completed successfully.
George then tried to determine the ef-
fect of the smaller ori ce on the penstock
waterhammer and turbine speed rise.
Paul informed him that governor time at
this facility was about 10 seconds to close
from full load opening. With this long
interval, George determined the turbine
would reach runaway (maximum turbine
rotational speed) on any shutdown great-
er than about 60 percent generator load.
Even with a faster governor time calculat-
ed to produce a 45 percent waterhammer
(the normal maximum for a penstock),
the speed rise would be to runaway.
George now focused on the generator
inertia because a higher inertia would re-
duce speed rise. The inertia value George
initially found was from a table for modern
generators. However, generator rotors built
before about 1940 are large and heavy due
to the extra spacing between poles required
to accommodate the thick insulation. This
meant data for modern generators is not
applicable to this older unit.
Finally, in looking through his library
of hydro books for an inertia value for
the unit, George found a table listing the
inertias of Westinghouse vertical water-
wheel generators. The book, Hydro-electric
Handbook, was dated 1927. From this table,
George was able to produce a formula for
inertia of this particular unit as a function
of kilovolt-amperes (kVa) and speed. This
calculation resulted in a higher inertia than
those supplied for modern units. Using this
higher inertia, George determined that
speed rise on full load rejection would be
less than 50 percent with a governor time
of 2.8 seconds. In addition, waterhammer
would be less than 50 percent, an accept-
able design for an isolated power plant.
However, the current governor close
time was about 10 seconds. Should the
utility shorten it to about 3 seconds?
After deliberation, Paul decided to re-
tain the slow closing time. His intention
was to keep penstock waterhammer as low
as possible, in view of t he fact that the steel
penstock was quite deteriorated. Because
this plant was connected to a large grid,
fast governing times were not a neces-
sity. Also, the well-built old Westinghouse
generator had demonstrated that runaway
speeds were not a problem.
Lessons learned
First, always test a new computer surge
tank design program on an existing
tank, to determine whether it reproduces
the range of water surge levels observed
within the tank.
Second, if tank diameter is being
decreased, it is important to assess the
effect on the penstock, as the range of
surge pressures will change.
Third, retaining information for old
units often is dif cult. Such esoteric data
as generator inertia often is lost. In this
case, resort must be made to old refer-
ences. So don’t throw out that old book!
— By James L. Gordon, B.Sc., hydro-
power consultant
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