EFFICIENCY AND ENVIRONMENTAL FRIENDLINESS OF CHP SYSTEMS

Combined heat and power systems (CHP) integrate the production of heat and power into a single process that’s highly-efficient and environmentally-friendly. This process – also known as cogeneration – offers many benefits for municipal, industrial, commercial, and even residential facilities.

Here’s a closer look at CHP, including how it works and its many benefits:

How It Works

CHP is a combined heat and power system that provides both electric power and heat from a single source. Most electric utilities produce heat that isn’t used, but instead is sent into the cooling water, or into the atmosphere along with other greenhouse gases and pollutants.

This process wastes nearly two-thirds of the fuel’s energy, while a CHP system recovers almost all of the energy it produces.

CHP Benefits

CHP systems provide a number of benefits compared to conventional electricity and thermal energy productions, including:

Efficiency

Because CHP systems recover much of the wasted heat, they typically achieve efficiencies of up to 80 percent – and more.

Environmental

CHP reduces emissions of greenhouse gases and other pollutants because it uses less fuel to produce each unit of energy output.

Economy

Because of its high efficiency, CHP can save facilities considerable money on energy bills, while also providing a hedge against electricity and cost increases.

Reliability

CHP is an on-site generation source and can support continued operations in the event of a disaster or grid disruption.

RLN Energy Services offers power generation training services specializing in the electrical and mechanical industries. RLN is available for consultative services and can best recommend the best power system for your worksite.

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THE IMPORTANCE OF TESTING & REPAIR IN THE MAINTENANCE OF CAT GENERATORS

Purchasing a CAT generator and operating it is only the beginning of a full service cycle with RLN Energy Services. A service and training contract is absolutely crucial to the success and long service life of your generator sets. Our goal at RLN Energy Services is to provide you with a generator set, the training and the service to support a successful installation and long service life.

Testing Services

Vibration, thermal and ultrasonic testing services serve to protect your investment in a CAT generator set. RLN Energy Services offers all of these important tests.

The purpose of vibration testing is to determine if there are any issues with your rotating equipment. Depending on the readings we receive, we can tell what type of damage has occurred. Often, we can use the readings to isolate the damage down to a specific bearing.

Thermal imaging is another tool that we use to troubleshoot generator sets. We can find things such as loose, corroded and over-tightened connections by noting an abnormally high temperature. This temperature is due to increased resistance in the wire. Temperature differences can also be used to identify three-phase imbalances, failed components and more.

Ultrasonic testing is analyzing sounds on the higher end of the spectrum to identify problems with rotating equipment. It is possible to detect air/vacuum leakage and bearing failure among other issues.

Training Services

The most important part of a field service and maintenance contract is the training of your own maintenance staff to correctly diagnose and repair your generator set. We advise investing in a power generation training service. The ideal training program starts with classes taught on site by one of our instructors that cumulate in a field exercise on your equipment.

Additionally, training is the best way to add value to your employees and in turn, your company. Outside of the obvious cost savings, a well-trained technician is less prone to injury due to safely performing maintenance and start-up procedures.

Give RLN Energy a call today to see how we can help you keep your power generation equipment running!

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Cleaner Fuel For a Healthier Industrial Economy

Green technology is a buzz term that has been getting thrown around in industry for quite some time. In the industrial power generation sector, this usually comes down to the benefits of diesel versus natural gas engines. Caterpillar natural gas engines are some of the cleanest and most cost efficient engines with the best expense to horsepower and emissions to horsepower ratios on the market. These engines provide numerous advantages over diesel engines as well. Another point that separates CAT from other engines are the numerous technological advantages they provide for engine selection and set up as well as superior serviceability.

Diesel Versus Natural Gas

Natural Gas is attractive to corporations and individuals that want to use a fuel that provides lower emissions than diesel. The typically natural gas engine provides anywhere from 14 to 21% fewer SOx and NOx emissions than diesel, which is a rather large difference when considering the volume of industrial emissions there are. Outside of lower emissions, Natural gas is a cheaper fuel to utilize than diesel in most situations. It takes approximately 126.67 cubic feet of natural gas compressed at standard conditions to have the same energy content as 0.88 gallons of number two diesel. When back calculating cost savings, even with a reduced energy density in comparison to number two diesel, you have approximately 50% savings when utilizing natural gas over diesel. This cost savings is amplified in the current oil market due to natural gas prices that have failed to recover while crude has steadily made a comeback.

The CAT Advantage

CAT engines are some of the easiest to service and operate with customer support that blows other manufacturers out of the water. However, there is a major advantage cat provides that others do not; Electric Power Specsizer and Gas Engine Rating Pro [GERP] software. The Specsizer software uses proprietary algorithms to help determine the optimum generator set for your application. GERP is unique in that it will build a custom profile for an engine based upon information about your fuel composition, site data such as elevation, and even optimize your emissions should you have tougher standards to meet. No other manufacturer provides these types of tools to squeeze out the best performance from their engines. This alone solidifies CAT at the top choice for natural gas engines.

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