What happens in a coal power station?
A lot happens – it is a complete course in thermodynamics to give a full answer, but, here goes: Assumption – it is a modern 500MW set in UK. The coal is fed in to mills, which grind the coal into a fine dust similar in size to talc. This is blown onto the boiler, where it immediately ignites, transferring heat to the water and steam in the boiler tubes. The hot products of combustion are sucked out of the boiler, through the precipitators, which remove the pf (pulverised fuel) dust from the gases, and the gases are then treated and released to atmosphere. The pf dust is collected in hoppers, and is transported to land-fill, or used in building. The water, which has been heated in the boiler, is then divided into water and steam in the boiler drum, and the water is returned to the boiler wall tubes for more heating, and the steam, at very high pressure and temperature, is then fed into a turbine which is turned at 50 cycles per second. The generator is directly coupled to the turbine,
