Turbine Inlet Cooling Association (TICA)

The mission of the Turbine Inlet Cooling Association (TICA) is to promote the development and exchange of knowledge related to gas turbine inlet cooling (TIC) for enhancing power generation worldwide. Turbine inlet cooling provides a cost-effective, energy-efficient, and environmentally beneficial means to enhance power generation capacity and efficiency. Therefore, the vision of TICA is that TIC will play an increasingly important role in satisfying the power generation needs of the global marketplace.

• Opportunity to provide turbine inlet cooling information to national and international policy organizations including utility organizations, state policy makers, industry organizations
• Interact with other suppliers and users worldwide in providing answers to questions about usage and benefits of turbine inlet cooling
• Listing of the company profile at the TICA Website that gets up to 24,000 hits per month. (TICA Website ranks No.1 on Google and Yahoo search engines when searched for “Turbine Inlet Cooling”)
• Link to your company website from your company profile at the TICA website
• E-mail link to your contact person from your company profile at the TICA website
• Listing of the company projects in the TIC Experience Database at the TICA website
• Publicizing of the company press releases, publications and presentations related to TIC on the TICA web site and at TICA booths during trade exhibitions
• Display and distribution of one company document/literature at the TICA booth at the annual Power-Gen International and Electric Power exhibitions.
• Five complimentary admission tickets (normally $95 per ticket) to the annual POWER-GEN International exhibition
• Five complimentary admission tickets (normally $75 per ticket) to the Annual Electric Power exhibitions
• Opportunity to meet potential customers at the TICA booths at POWER-GEN and Electric Power exhibitions
• One link from one of your company’s entries in the TICA Installation Database to detailed information and sales documents at your website
• Right to purchase additional links from your company’s entries in the TICA Installation Database to detailed information and sales documents at your website
• Discounted fee (normally $50 per person) for registering for the Annual POWER-GEN International conference
• Access to the Members Only section of the TICA website which includes more technical and other details than in the publicly available version of the TICA database of TIC installations and other information.
• Right to use of TICA logo in your literature and website
• Opportunity to participate in TICA leadership and affect the direction of TICA activities

TICA membership is open to a broad spectrum of organizations and individuals who play a role in the power generation industry. A brief prospectus on the benefits of joining TICA is available for your perusal. Our dues structure reflects the different levels of value which TICA believes different organizations will receive through their membership.

Membership Classifications:

• GT Owner-Commercial /Industrial (Complimentary through June 30, 2017; Otherwise $1,000) - Most of the owners of GTs used for Power Generation such as IPPs, Industrial Cogen Plants, Utilities and Commercial Cogeneration Plants.
• GT Owner-Non-Profit Organizations (Complimentary through June 30, 2017; Otherwise $500) - Schools, Hospitals and Universities with GTs (typically smaller GTs 15 MW and below).
• GT OEM ($2,000) --- Any manufacturer of Gas Turbines.
• TIC OEM/Contractor ($2,000) - Suppliers of TIC Equipment Packages and/or TIC Turnkey Installation Contractors
• GT EPC Contractor ($2,000) - Engineering Companies, Construction Contractors, or EPC Contractors who design or build GT Power Plants.
• Component Supplier to OEM ($2,000) - Component suppliers to either TIC Contractors or GT OEMs. Examples include: Filter House Mfgrs, Coil Mfgrs, Chiller Manufacturers, Evaporative Media Suppliers, Cooling Tower Mfgrs, Wet Surface Air Condensers, etc.
• Consultant with 5 or less people ($250) - Consultants to GT Owners & Developers.
• Consultant with 6 or more people ($500) - Consultants to GT Owners & Developers.
• Student ($100) - from any Education Institution
• Qualified Non-Profit Organization ($100) - Education or Research Institutions and other non-profit organizations who do not own GT-based power plants.
• Qualified Association (Reciprocal Zero Net Cost) - Qualified associations that have some of the same goals as those of TICA can become members of TICA by providing membership to TICA in their associations at 'zero net cost' to the cognizant organizations.
• Qualified Government Organizations (Free) - Government and Regulatory Agencies, who do not own GT-based power plants but provide an advisory or regulatory function to the Power Industry.

ECONOMICSThe economics of TIC is discussed using the examples of two cogeneration plants located in Los Angeles, CA. One plant deploys an industrial/frame CT of 83.5 MW capacity and the other uses an aeroderivative CT of 42 MW capacity.

When the ambient temperature in Los Angeles is 87^oF dry-bulb and coincident wet-bulb temperature is 64^oF the output of the uncooled 83.5 MW and 42 MW cogeneration plants drops to about 75.3 MW and 32.1 MW, respectively. Compared to the rated capacities of the two plants, the reduced outputs represent loss of capacity by about 10% and 24%, respectively.

The technical and economic impacts of using TIC for the above two types of plants are discussed for three cooling technologies: Wetted Media (Evap Cooling), Fogging and Electric Chillers. As pointed out earlier in the discussion on technologies, the results of various TIC technologies depend on the weather (dry-bulb and wet-bulb temperatures) for the plant location.

Output Enhancement
Assuming a 90% and 98% approach to the difference between the dry-bulb and wet-bulb temperatures for the wetted media (evaporative cooling) and fogging technologies, these two technologies can cool the inlet air to 66.3^oF and 64.5^oF respectively. Assuming that the electric chiller system is designed for cooling the inlet air to 45^oF, such a system requires total cooling capacities of 2,330 RT and 1200 RT for the 83.5 MW and 42 MW CTs, respectively. Assuming a typical electric chiller power requirement of 0.65kW/RT and an additional 0.16kW/RT for chilled water, condenser water and cooling tower pumps the total parasitic power needs for the chiller capacities are 1.9 MW and 0.96 MW for the larger and the smaller CTs, respectively. Comparisons of various TIC technologies with the uncooled CT in terms of total power plant output are shown in 1 and Figures 4 and 5.

The results in Figure 4 show that evaporative cooling and fogging can enhance the capacities of the larger uncooled system (75.3 MW) to 81.3 MW and 81.9 MW, respectively. Therefore, these TIC technologies can restore most of the 10% lost capacity to within 3% of the rated capacity.

The results for the aeroderivative CT, shown in Figure 5, are similar but more pronounced than those for the industrial/frame CT. The capacity of this uncooled system goes up from 34.1 MW to 39.9 MW and 40.4 MW by the evaporative cooling and fogging technologies, respectively and thus, restores most of the 24% lost capacity to within 4% of the rated capacity.

Even though the results of using evaporative cooling and fogging are very good, these technologies are not able to achieve the full-rated capacities. In addition, the extent of cooling achieved by these technologies depends on the ambient wet-bulb temperature. If the wet-bulb temperature goes up (i.e. outside humidity increases) their effectiveness decreases. Therefore, the results of these technologies for this plant in Houston, TX will be less impressive because of typically higher ambient humidity than that in Los Angeles, CA or Las Vegas, NV.

The results in Figures 4 and 5 show that the electric chiller system yields maximum power capacity enhancement even after accounting for the large parasitic needs of the chiller system. The chiller system in this example is designed to cool the inlet air to 45^oF and is able to achieve output capacities that exceed the rated capacities. Another advantage of the chiller system is that it can be designed to achieve almost constant output independent of the ambient dry- and wet-bulb temperatures. Of course, the chiller system costs more to install than the evaporative cooling and fogging systems.

Economic Benefits
The economic benefits of the three TIC technologies, discussed above, on the installed cost for the total plant capacity for the two types of CTs are shown in Figures 6 through 9. The basis for the installed costs shown in these figures are as follows:

Cogeneration CT Plant: $750,000/MW
(No Cooling)
Wetted Media (Evap Cooling): $19,000/MW CT capacity at ISO
Fogging: $19,000/MW CT capacity at ISO
Electric Chiller: $800/RT