On the Development of China's Thermal Power in the 21st Century while Saving the Energy and Protecting the Environment

In light of China s Ninth Five-year Plan (1996-2000) for Electric Power Industry & the Long Term Targets by the Year 2010, the paper considers the strategy for developing China’s thermal power in the 21st century shall be the efficiency and cleaning technology of coal use. Especially important is the structure of power sources and configuration of technology process, and secondly the implementation of energy saving and environmental protection ideology in the various stages of thermal power construction and design work.

Thermal Insulation Materials of Alumina Based Porous Ceramics

Significant energy saving effects can be made through the improvement of furnace refractories,especially the thermal insulation refractories. In this study,the preparation and the application of different alumina based porous ceramics were briefly introduced. Alumina based porous ceramics were prepared combined foaming method with gelcasting,sol- gel process or cement curing process. The influences of different preparation methods on the sintering shrinkage, porosity, phase composition, microstructure, compressive strength and thermal conductivity were discussed. Alumina based porous ceramics with relatively high strength and low thermal conductivity could be obtained through the above mentioned methods. Compared with the traditional lining materials,about 40% energy could be saved when they were used as the furnace wall.

Experimental test of a building thermal system for preventive maintenance based on thermoeconomic analysis

An analysis of the sectorial structure of energy consumption shows that residential and tertiary sector buildings are the third-highest consumers,responsible for 29.5%of a city’s final energy consumption.The Building Quality Control Laboratory of the Basque Government aims to promote quality,innovation,and sustainability in buildings.To accomplish this goal,it has constructed an experimental facility with different energy generation technologies and a very versatile control system for testing different energy systems and operation modes.In this study,we tested a facility for supplying domestic hot water and heating for a multi-family house by means of a condensing boiler and an aerothermal heat pump(together with the corresponding control).This installation could reproduce the thermal demands required to be satisfied by the generation equipment through a programmed operation of the installation based on real demands.Additionally,this installation was analyzed using thermoeconomics(TE)to solve problems unable to be solved using traditional energy analyses based on the First Law of Thermodynamics.These problems include:(1)Determining the costs of the products of the installation based on physical criteria,(2)detecting the places where losses actually occur,evaluating their costs,and proposing cost-effective improvements,and(3)diagnosing issues in the installation.As a result,this paper suggests a solution to the preventive maintenance problems confronting the technical maintenance personnel for thermal installations in buildings by applying TE knowledge and using real data collected from sensors.