General Electric has been focusing recently on implementing new power plant solutions that bring together the company's expertise with the newest development in digital solutions. That leads to a “holistic” approach that makes the company competitive in the market, according to Alex Evans, GE's sales director for F-Class Europe.
GE's Fleet360 total plant services solutions “tied with digital solutions places us well ahead of competition” he told Gas to Power Journal in an interview in December. “It's about the holistic solution which we provide” he said, adding that “the digital conversation we're having is a really exciting one, as it's the glue that holds the Fleet360 and the holistic solution together.”
“That allows customers to see in a one-stop-shop all the issues that they might have and how to maximise asset performance” he explained.
Overall, technological advancements made by GE recently in terms of power plants upgrades offerings include sequential upgrade, which will “support customer flexibility”; emissions reduction, which is “critical in terms of addressing climate change” and capacity efficiency and reliability, he explained. “One of the key upgrades that we have is the Advanced Performance Package (APP) which is a specific gas turbine upgrade which allows for extended maintenance intervals” he added. In addition, increasing capacity and reducing fuel consumption are other solutions that GE is offering generators.
Uniper's Enfield and Grain upgrades to “future-proof stations”
Among the contracts recently announced by the company and which envisage the implementation of GE's Fleet 360 there are the upgrades of Uniper's Enfield and Grain CCGT power plants in the UK, which have a capacity of 400 MW and 1200 MW respectively.
"The deal with Uniper for the upgrade and extension of Isle of Grain and Enfield is a really comprehensive deal which will future-proof these stations for the next 20 years” commented Evans. “It involves upgrading the turbines and boosting the capacity by 4% as well reducing fuel consumption and improving the whole plant's flexibility and introducing digital solutions.”
“We brought large scale digital and industrial elements that GE has and combined them with Alstom's broader power plant solutions and we can now offer solutions for the entire power plant station” he said, adding “that's something no one else can do.”
Moreover, “in the Uniper's contract, there's an outcome-based solution whereby we monitor by digital and know the performance of the plant that we deliver” he explained. “And if we come with a new upgrade, they will reward us based on what we achieve compared to the baseline.”
Capacity market “needs fine tuning”
Asked about the outcome of recent capacity market auctions in the UK, and whether the relatively low price at which they settled represents a challenge for both generators and companies such as GE offering power plants solutions, he said “the low price seen at the auction is a concern for the customers but having the capacity scheme there is the main thing.”
“We're seeing a low price at the moment which is indicative of small units coming on, but I'm confident that in the end it will all work.”
“The problem currently is that power prices don't rise, so they don't incentivise people to buy new power stations leading to risks of black-outs in the future” he explained. “So the capacity market aims to address that issue, but it needs fine tuning and there's more work that needs to be done.”
Moreover, "one of the surprises of the capacity market (in the UK at the moment) is that you have a lot of smaller diesel generators cashing in on that” he added. “Ultimately the government's goal is to deliver sustainable capacity with efficient methods, such as CCGT” he pointed out. The auctions in early December saw “mostly small generators (being awarded), but there's a new auction coming in January and speaking to a lot of users, a lot of them are hoping to achieve additional revenues from there” Evans said.
“It's really important to have that as having efficient power stations running is an essential part of the energy mix, especially the ones that we have, which have nearly 60% efficiency” he added. “If they 're facing a risk of being shut down that's a problem for everyone so the fact the capacity market ensures they keep running is critical.”
“Looking at the Uniper deal, for example, we're really future-proofing and maximising what they can get out of the capacity mechanism and keep their costs low” he said.
China and India “biggest opportunity” at global level
Asked about GE's commitment at a wider global level, Evans said for the company “the biggest opportunity is to upgrade coal plants in India and China” as part of the global focus on reducing carbon emissions.
According to new analysis by GE, if the global power fleet were to implement existing more advanced technologies this could lead to a 10% annual reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from coal and gas-fired electricity generation globally.
“This is significant, it means the equivalent of 250 million US cars taken off the road or the entire annual CO2 emissions of the UK and France could be eliminated annually, if technology to boost the efficiency of coal and gas-fired power plants were installed in every existing plant around the world” he said.