Large endeavor to revitalize the unit B1 is coming to an end and final testing of all the works started which will put the item on this capital project. Thus Kostolac become significant, stable electricity producer in Serbia.
Although from the beginning the works have been done in very bad weather conditions, floods in May, July, August and even 52 days of strong southeast wind which slowed the performers on external works primarily on electrostatic, it comes to the end. In the coming days it should make all those works that will provide security and guarantee the quality. Thus the significant part of the works on the project of the first phase of the loan agreement with the People’s Republic of China comes to the end.
To remind that the first phase of an international loan agreement with Chinese partners includes the following projects: revitalization of unit B1, revitalization of unit B2, construction of railways, ports and a desulphurization system. Revitalization of the unit B2 is completed, the revitalization of unit B1 comes to an end, the construction of a desulphurization system is underway, while the projects construction of railways and ports is expected to start in the coming year, according to Zoran Stanojevic, director of the electricity production: Revitalization of unit B1 is a complex technical venture, which encompassed not only interventions with Chinese-funded arrangement, but also included additional activities, by which we managed to complete a revitalization of thermal power capacity. These additional activities, as part of the revitalization of unit B1, were financed with own funds of SC “TE-KO Kostolac”.
According to the plan, the revitalization of unit B1 is expected to be completed on December 1st. During the revitalization of unit B1, there were objective obstacles, which were of such character that left an impact on the functioning of the whole EPS and state: -Extremely adverse weather conditions caused multimillions damage to the energy sector in Serbia. Extensive rainfall in May and July this year have caused a state of emergency in the country, and they jeopardize our normal functioning and led to the displacement of the intended plans in our company, said the director Stanojevic.
Extensive torrential flows have led to the sinking of a part of the open pit “Drmno”, and a large pitsankin the Thermal power plant “Kostolac B”, excavated for the chimney for desulphurization and also for the pit below electrostatic precipitators: – They were tied hands in this situation. Simply, it was prevented from carrying out the construction work on the pit concreting, as well as preparing the necessary amount of steel structure. In this situation we were in the second half of July until August11th. Our Chinese partners from CMEC Corporation responsible for the installation of electrostatic precipitators, which belongs to the boiler plant, were not able to perform work due to bad weather. This fact has caused that revitalization process lasted longer than we planned, but we are doing everything in our power that unit B1 be ready to produce electricity. This was followed by the rehabilitation of the consequences caused by bad weather and we have started draining the water out of the pit, which has not been done only once, but several times because of abundant precipitation, unfortunately, once again led to the flooding of the pit. This situation has resulted in moving the completion of the revitalization of the unit B1.
Strong gusts of wind also caused the large cranes and work on the installation of electrostatic precipitators. It is the raising of large elements, sediment and discharge electrodes, parts of the brewing unit and confusion, to a height of 50 m descent into the bowels of electrostatic precipitators. These elements of electrostatic precipitators have a length up to 15 meters, a height of 2 to 3 meters, and are very sensitive to changes in air flow, indicating Zoran Stanojevic: – The previous plan envisages that these jobs run from late August to late September, but the strong winds conditioned to suspend the crane operation, so that the realization of these tasks followed evena month later and led to further deceleration of planned dynamics for revitalization of unit B1. After bad weather, flood periods and period of strong wind hitting it became clear that the unit B1 will be longer in the revitalization. Our partner in this business, CMEC Corporation, stated on one of the joint meeting that originally agreed deadline for completion of the revitalization of unit B1 would not be achievable, but would last twenty days longer. We continued with all the works and we came to the fact that we did dry cleaning on November 14th, after which also began the final phase of unit B1movementfrom the revitalization.
The final phase of starting unit B1 from revitalization makes several technical phases, which can be conditionally divided into 4 parts. The first phase makes wall drying, which is a prerequisite that this wall in the future work of unit B1remains reliable at high temperatures and protects against heat damage. The wall drying will be followed by blow, or the process of impurities elimination from the pipe system boiler and steam line of work, primarily for corrosion and debris from installation: -If the measurement of the steam purity after blowing shows satisfactory results, it will be possible that clean steam from the boiler does not cause damage to the turbine blades. Then we need to establish a working scheme, we have to take off the provisional and compile all the pipelines. It is a process that takes about 8 working days, which takes so long because of the large number of welds in pipelines of high pressure. Besides it has being played the release of individual devices and unit B1 will be brought into a state of the workmovement, not only in the mechanical part, but also in the electrical. These are indicative terms, and we are trying to do everything in our power that act of the synchronization of the unit B1 to the electricity grid in Serbia, which represents the fourth stage, the last stage in the final phaseof the unitcommissioning, be completed before December20th. The fact is that in the revitalization of unit B1 participate in numerous companies, which have affected the respect of Gantt charts dynamics.
It should be noted that it was done underwent reconstruction of the mills, so now the fineness of their work is in accordance with the given measures. It was done also the denitrification, namely reduction of nitrogen oxides, which will be obligatory to be introduced by the end of 2017th under the Directive on industrial furnaces and Directive on the large combustion plants, after which will not be possible that operate plants that did not introduce it.