Electrical Engineering Industrial Training Reports Electrical Engineering : Pallivasal Power Plant

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Introduction
Pallivasal Power Plant is the first Power Project in Kerala. It was inaugurated in 1940. Though it was started as a 200 kw installation in 1928 by the Kannan Devan Hill Produce Co., it was upgraded to large scale plant later to meet the increased demand for power in Kerala. At present the power station housed 6 generators, three each of 5 MW each and rest of 7.5 MW each. The present capacity of the plant is 37.5 Mega watts and augmentation projects are going on currently to increase the capacity to 60 MW.

Water Flow

Water for the power plant is obtained from Muthirapuzha River. Kundala Dam checks the flow of the river upstream and supplies water to Mattupetty Check dam. A 2 MW plant is installed here. Water flows from its tail race to the Head Works. Here the water level has to be maintained at 58.6 meters. If this is exceeded, the water overflows and if it is lesser, air may seep into the tunnel, causing tripping of the alternators at power plant.

Water from the Head Works flows through the tunnels to the valve house equipped with butter fly valves .Four penstocks start from here, out of these two penstocks split to supply six alternators The tail race from Pallivasal is collected in a pond and is pumped through a head of 9 m by the Sengulam pump house to Sengulam Power Station where it is further utilized.

Reservoirs
Level Storage

Mattupetty 1592.7 37.2

Kundala 1758.7 7.787

Generator Data

Manufacturer Alstom Power Type 3 phase Power 5550 kVA Rated voltage 11 kV Rated current 292 A Power factor 0.9 Speed 750 rpm Frequency 50 Hz Class of insulation F Excitation 34 V, 798 A

Turbine Details

Horizontal Axis Pelton Turbine Runner Outside diameter = 1637.2 mm Runner Pitch Diameter = 1295 mm Rated output = 4535kW/nominal Rated head = 572.1 m Rated flow = 0.91 m3 Operating Speed = 750 rpm

Nozzle Diameter = 130 cm

General Working of the plant

Water from the dam comes through the tunnel and penstock. At the inlet of the turbine, water flow is controlled by a mechanical system consisting of inlet spherical valve having a maintenance seal and service seal. The governor system consisting of hydraulic controls is regulated by an operator interface through SCADA (Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition) . It is a PC based Intouch Software which provides automated means to control the hydroelectric plant.

Water from the inlet pipe impinges on the runner of the turbine after passing through a nozzle. The deflector plates are provided between the nozzle and the turbine runner. It is used to control the amount of water falling on the runner.

Generators used are self excited ones with brushless excitations. This consists of power diode rectifiers providing flux for the alternators. Once synchronizing speed is achieved the generator frequency, voltage, must match that of the electrical distribution system, the process is called synchronization. Once synchronized the main circuit breakers closes connecting the generator to the electric system.

Generation Details

The installed capacity of the plant is 37.5 MW. But all the generators are not run at all the times and the desired generators are run as per the load conditions. Usually all generators are running at the night times as per instructions from the Load Dispatch Centre. Out of the total generation of 20.5899 Million units(MU) , Pallivasal contributes about 0.3205MU. The cumulative generation for the month of February was found to be 13.5408. The load of the plant is higher when the tail end stations Sengulam an Panniar are not operating due to reasons like low head or for maintenance and the operating of Pallivasal is dependent on these stations also.

Protection

When a fault occurs or a warning condition occurs, the horn will be activated and a message on the SCADA will indicate the cause of the alarm. When stopping a unit, the unit will unload until it reaches a minimum excitation value and then the main circuit breakers are opened. Emergency open can also be used.

Pump House

The pump house houses three synchronous motors driving centrifugal pumps.

Pump Type BHM 100 Total Head 14.63m Pump Input677.31 Speed 365 rpm Rate of flow 4250 lit /sec

The pump house is for pumping the water from the tail race of the Pallivasal Plant to a height of about 14 meters so that the water can attain sufficient head so that it can flow to the Sengulam Power Plant. The pump house is used very often as the collector in the plant becomes full and when the plant at Sengulam is operating. There are two 11 kV / 3.3 kV transformers and Air Break Circuit Breakers are used.

Synchronous motors in the pumps

Ratings Power 750 kW Insulation Class F Speed 375 rpm No. of Phases 3 Voltage 3.3 kV Frequency50Hz Current 147 A Rotor DC 220 V, 590 A

The two synchronous motors are supplies from 11kV/3.3kV Transformers. There are two non return valves to prevent the back flow of water into the pumps.

Switching Yard

This yard houses eight transformers to supply the feeders. Six 11kV/66kV transformers are supplied directly from the alternator in delta/ delta mode. These 66 kV outputs are supplied to Alwaye (2 feeders), Kothamangalam (2 feeders). There is also a tie line of 66kV with Sengulam plant for synchronization. The yard consists of two bus bars one Live and the other Transfer bus. There exist two distribution feeders from the power plant (High range 1 and High range 2) to supply to the local areas and for the power plant. The step down is done by 66/11 KV transformers.

General Machine Details

Water is supplied to the Pallivasal injectors through an inlet pipe connected to the existing penstock. Between the injector and inlet pipe an inlet spherical valve is used to isolate the unit and even to stop it for emergency shut down. The existing types of injectors are Elbow type and straight type. The Straight type is used in Pallivasal Plant. In this Servomotor controlling the needle opening is inside the injector . This provides more efficiency of the water flowing. Pallivasal characteristics resulted in the selection of horizontal axis Pelton runner, having 20 buckets for generators 1 to 3 and seventeen buckets for generators 4 to 6. The runners are made of stainless steel for high strength and better cavitation and abrasion resistance. Collector is a component adapted to bring water to injector with minimum head loss. Pallivasal 4 to 6 generators has no collectors. Brushless exciter is installed at the non drive end of the rotor and its main parts are a fixed inductor and a rotating armature. The generator rotor excitation is produced by the exciters the rotating which produces three phase alternating current. This current is rectified through a rotting diode assembly on the same shaft end.

Other Details

The power house also has a diesel generator set for charging a set of batteries which provides the excitation during starting and also acts as an inverter for auxiliary lighting purposes. The power house is currently of 30 MW capacities. Pallivasal Augmentation Project is undergoing to raise the capacity to 60 MW.

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