Anti-Icing in Gas Turbines

Abstract: This thesis gives a thorough description of the icing mechanisms in gas turbines, the underlying physics of ice and ice types that can form in gas turbines. The primary intention of this thesis is to investigate the icing condition regions leading to ice formation in gas turbines. The icing problem in gas turbines is explained in detail in this thesis. The different ice types, icing mechanism in gas turbines and ambient conditions leading to icing are reported. Ambient factors and other factors that can affect icing conditions are also discussed. The icing conditions have been investigated for different air velocities in the inlet system of the gas turbine and with various ambient conditions. A recovery factor has been used in the calculations of icing conditions. The recovery factor gives the icing surface temperature which lies between the air static temperature and air total temperature. The recovery factor differs from laminar till turbulent flow. The experimental value 0, 8 is taken in the calculations. Ice formation locations in the gas turbines? inlet systems are also covered. My study to the icing mechanism in gas turbines shows that there is no hazard for icing when air velocity is very high because of great air temperature depression. Furthermore, as long as the surface temperature is above the water saturation temperature, condensation will not occur and ice will not form even if the surface temperature is below freezing point temperature. The highest risk of ice building lies specifically between the highest and lowest velocity, in contrast to what was believed earlier that the risk lied at highest velocity. A possible solution to the icing problem in gas turbines is also presented in this thesis. The different anti icing systems that can protect the gas turbine is investigated. I focused mainly on the compressor bleed heating system and hot water heat exchanger system in my calculations. The heat power that is needed to warm up the incoming air to the gas turbine has been calculated for two Siemens gas turbines; SGT-700 that is using the compressor bleeds anti-icing system and SGT-800 that is using a water heat exchanger anti-icing system. The results show that the compressor bleed anti-icing system has a larger influence on gas turbine performance than the hot water heat exchanger. The pulse jet self cleaning filter is also mentioned in this part to explain why pulse filter has been used as an anti-icing system.