The carbon capture and storage (CCS) facility at the Boundary Dam Power Station is back online after a scheduled shutdown that lasted approximately two months.
Unit 3 at the Boundary Dam Power Sation was down from April 5-May 4. The CCS unit was offline from March 10-May 7. After it started up, there were a few small outages until May 12, as SaskPower did some calibration testing of some of the sensors inside the compressor, which was part of the process.
Howard Matthews, the vice-president of power production for SaskPower, pointed out that the work completed during the shutdown was scheduled.
鈥淲e do boiler work on a regular basis, just like we do on all of our boilers. There鈥檚 nothing unusual there,鈥� said Matthews.
Of particular note is that the compressor inside the capture island went through its first regular scheduled overhaul since the facility opened in 2014.
鈥淚t was quite exciting to see that very large compressor apart and put back together again, and started up and running very well,鈥� said Matthews.
There is only a handful of compressors like this in North America, so there was quite a bit of interest in the work.
It was scheduled to be completed in 60 days, and 62 days were needed.
鈥淲e were very pleased, on our first time ever taking this very large machine apart, and putting it back together again, and having it run so well when we started it up, that it was pretty much right on schedule,鈥� said Matthews.
A 20,000-horsepower motor drives the compressor, and Matthews said he amazed with the precision that goes into fitting the parts. All of the piping connections are an incredibly precise fit.
They also cleaned a lot of the equipment inside the CCS facility, and made sure the amine was in good shape. Amine is the chemical solution used to absorb the carbon dioxide and the sulphur dioxide.
As for Unit 3, there were the usual inspections of the boilers during a shutdown, and there was lots of other work around the auxiliary equipment, including electrical equipment, pumps and motors on the turbine and generator.
鈥淯sually on these types of overhauls or shutdowns, which are regularly scheduled, the vast majority of the work goes on the boiler or the coal pipes, and pulverizes those sorts of things.鈥�
Since it came back online, the facility has been operating well. There was an electrical fault involving a short circuit in one of the pieces of equipment, and to be able to isolate it properly, it was shut down quickly. The repair was made and it was brought back online in about 36 hours.
SaskPower has been able to make delivery of CO2 to its off-taker every day since the shutdown ended.
鈥淲e continue to optimize what our capture rate is. What we鈥檙e really working towards is getting our cost down on CCS to allow us to make the best case going forward around what the cost of CCS is,鈥� said Matthews.
SaskPower is also working at the carbon capture test facility inside the Shand Power Station to make improvements around the process and lower the cost.
