POWER December 2012 - 14

Note on the Oconee Top Plant
Some of our readers may have been confused by the wording
of a press release about our November issue's nuclear
Top Plants, the table of contents blurb about Duke's Oconee
plant, or a sentence in the cover story about that plant.
In the interest of brevity, it seems we sacrificed clarity.
We did not mean to imply that this was the first of any
digital control systems upgrades in the U.S. In fact, POWER
has written about such upgrades at Oconee and elsewhere
in the past. The award this year was for a specific safetyrelated
system digital upgrade.
Derek Halverson, a Nuclear Regulatory Commission spokesman,
told POWER on November 8 that what Oconee installed
was " the first complete integrated digital reactor protection
and engineered safeguards system of any U.S. commercial
nuclear power plant. " Halverson further clarified: " Many NRClicensed
plants have at least partially upgraded their control
systems, both safety related and non-safety related, from
analog to digital technology. For example, many plants have
installed digital technology in at least a small portion of their
safety-related I&C systems, even if only to support operator
indications. However, there are still safety-related I&C systems
at Oconee and the other NRC licensed nuclear power
plants that remain analog. "
6. A new lease on life. Modernization of the Boulder Canyon
Hydroelectric Facility left one failed 10-MW turbine in place and replaced
the other 10-MW turbine with a new, highly efficient 5-MW turbine
that has increased generation by 30%. Courtesy: City of Boulder
ity and keep it operational for 50 more years. Its developers
say that though it is smaller, it produces 30% more power
because it is more efficient.
For the City of Boulder, refurbishing the plant also has deep,
historical significance. The city contracted URS Corp. and Native
Cultural Services to complete detailed records of the historical
equipment prior to removal in order to preserve the design,
construction, and operational history of the original facility.
As well as preparing a narrative history of the project, the city
has preserved historical equipment in place for educational and
display purposes (Figures 5 and 6). The research has yielded
several interesting facts about the facility, including that it was
the first structure in which acetylene welding in conjunction
with the ball-peen welding procedure was used-a method that
significantly advanced penstock technology.
The project is one of seven hydropower projects selected by
the Department of Energy (DOE) for a total of up to $30.6 million
in funding through the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment
Act. These were cost-shared projects that upgraded
existing hydropower facilities without requiring significant civil
works modifications to dams. Like the Boulder project, several
call for upgrading antiquated turbines: replacing 1940s and
1960s vintage turbines with stainless steel turbines and runners
at four Alabama Power Co. hydro plants on the Coosa River,
for example, or replacing four 90-year-old Francis turbines with
stainless steel turbines (and increasing annual generation by
23%) at Alcoa's Tapoco Cheoah plant in Robbinsville, N.C. The
Boulder project received $1.18 million from the DOE toward an
estimated project cost of $5.155 million.
This project, though small, has garnered wide attention, including
a mention from the National Hydropower Association.
The industry group said in October that similar upgrades could
add nearly 9 GW of capacity across the country.
14-MW Solar PV Plant Completed at
Naval Station
The U.S. Navy in late October saw the completion of its largest
solar generation system, a 13.78-MW (DC) solar photovoltaic
circle 8 on reader service card
14
www.powermag.com
POWER | December 2012
http://www.powermag.com
POWER December 2012

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of POWER December 2012
