Mine power station
A pit power plant , and coal mine power plant is a power plant , which is a mine ( "pit", " bill ") with power supplies and / or its fuel obtained directly from a mine.
The mine power plant covers the mine’s own electrical energy requirements for mining, extraction, ventilation, water drainage, etc., as well as possibly the electricity and process heat requirements of other connected production facilities (e.g. briquette factories , coking plants , smelting works , ...). Surplus can be fed into the public grid.
Mine power plant types
Technically, any type of power plant is in principle suitable for supplying a mine. In practice, however, there are predominantly those types for which an economic advantage results from the combined operation of the power plant and mine:
Coal power plants
In the common sense, the term is mainly used for coal-fired power plants that are directly connected to a coal mine and whose power supply is used. Here a bilateral delivery takes place, because in return for the electricity supplied, the power plant receives its fuel mainly from the pit. Most of the time, the mine and the power station have the same owner / operator, so that there is no trading in electricity and coal, but rather internal accounting ( vertical integration ).
Coal mine power plants are usually built in the immediate vicinity of the mine, so that, ideally, the coal can be transported using continuous conveyors such as conveyor belt systems without laborious reloading onto vehicles . Transport by train or other vehicles is less common.
In addition to the supply of electrical energy for its own needs, a coal mine power plant in hard coal mines has the important function of serving as a buyer for inferior coal from the mine. This is in particular the ballast coal from coal washing as well as fine-grain fragments ( grit , coal mines, ...) that arise during extraction and processing. This coal could only be sold on the free market at very low prices. Due to the inferior quality and / or the low calorific value , transport over long distances is not worthwhile in terms of energy or economy, but direct on-site power generation is probably. Without pit power plant often only the possibility of low-rank coal as waste remains on heaps discard.
In the case of lignite mines , due to the low calorific value of the coal, it is normal that almost all of the mine production is taken from a directly connected power plant. The term "mine power station" is usually only used if, conversely, the power station also mainly serves to supply the mine and its connected systems (e.g. refining plants ), which is the case with very few lignite power stations.
Hydropower plants
In some cases, old water art systems , which had previously served to drive artificial wheels , were converted with electrification in such a way that the pit water drives a turbine with a generator to generate electricity instead of an artificial wheel.
Example: Kaiser Wilhelm Shaft in Clausthal.
Mine gas power plant
In rare cases, the term “mine power plant” is used as a short form of “mine gas power plant”. These are small power plants that burn mine gas . For this see mine gas # Energetic use .
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Hans Bansen, E. Förster, Karl Teiwes: The water holding machines (= The mining machines - A collection of manuals for company officials . Volume 5 ). Springer, 1916.
- ↑ a b c D. Schwirlen: The functioning of a mine power plant using the example of the Wachtberg power plant . In: brown coal . Volume 40, No. 7 , 1988, ISSN 0341-1060 , pp. 212-218 .
- ↑ a b Wilhelm Hick: The combination of coal and iron as a business problem as reflected in the reorganization and re-entanglement on the Ruhr (= publications of the Schmalenbach Society for the Promotion of Business Research and Practice . Volume 28 ). West German Publishing House, 1960.
- ^ Wilhelm Gumz, Rudolf Karl August Regul: The coal: origin, properties, extraction and use, presented in a common comprehension . Glückauf, 1954.
- ^ Rolf Dieter Stoll, Christian Niemann-Delius, Carsten Drebenstedt , Klaus Müllensiefen (eds.): The lignite opencast mining: meaning, planning, operation, technology, environment . Springer, 2008, ISBN 978-3-540-78400-5 .
- ^ Leonhard Müller: Handbook of the electricity industry: Technical, economic and legal bases . 2nd Edition. Springer, 2001, ISBN 3-642-56805-X .
- ^ H. Kühl, Commission of the European Communities. Directorate-General Energy: Recovery of Methane from Mine Gas: Final Report . European Commission, 1996, ISBN 92-827-9272-2 .