Basic Operation of a Power Plant With its Importance

A country can move forward if it has a good source of Power Generation with the Transmission and Distribution system. By the amount of power generation, we can determine the country’s overall development. We will find lots of countries those who ensure a well-established power system and they are leading the world. It also can depend on many sources from where a country will generate electric power.

Those countries have fossil fuels like Coal, Gas, and Oil they can easily convert this energy to electricity. But now a day the price of fossil fuel moving upward and generating low-cost electricity getting impossible.

Establishing a Nuclear Power Plant is more expensive and for a small country cannot afford it. But if you want to use a renewable energy source for generating electricity then it also quite expensive and has fewer places where we can build a plant.

Basic Operation of a Power Plant:

First of all, I want to define a Power Plant. Power Plant is a center or an institute where we can generate electricity by using Generator and for this reason, we need fuel or some source of energy that we can convert it by the existing generator to electricity.

Normally generation voltage is about 11KV (Most of Time) and it is directly connected with the national grid. That’s means lots of power stations can connect with the power grid and together can be a well-established power network. A power station can have several Generators with different capacities.

Related: Caterpillar Diesel Engine Generator Troubleshooting Procedure

But all generators can connect with each other by synchronizing the system. After generating electricity we need a transmission and distribution network that we can receive power to our home and office. Transmission and Distribution system is inside parts of the National Grid Network. But a privet origination can build its very own power network.

If we want to transfer our generated electricity to a long distance then we need to step up our voltage to reducing voltage loss. Because a long-distance transmission line has voltage loss, for cable resistance. Voltage can be step up by a Step Up Power Transformer.

Now at the user end, again we need to reduce the voltage level. Because our daily electrical equipment will not work with high voltage. Now we need to step down the voltage by a Step-Down Power Transformer to get the required voltage level like 110V to 220V. If you want you can read this article, How is Electricity Produced and Delivered to Our Homes?

Generator, Transformer, Switch Gear, Control Gear is the most common electrical equipment in a power plant. The generator has a prime mover and for generating electricity we need to rotate the prime mover. There are several ways like Natural Energy, Fuel Energy, Nuclear Energy, Solar Energy we can rotate prime mover.

Related: Power Plant Classification Based on Fuel Type, Load and Place

But for choosing the transmission voltage must have maximum performances, improved regulation, and better plant economics. Generally, by using a Step Up Power Transformer we can step up our generated voltage to 132KV voltage and sent it to the transmission system or network.

Then a receiving substation step down this 132KV voltage to 33KV voltage and then this voltage is transferred to a distribution substation. But it can be different in your region. Then 33KV voltage line sent to is step down to 11KV voltage and again 11KV voltage to 0.415KV or 415V (Line to Line, Three Phase) and 220V (Line to Neutral, Single Phase).

Use and Importance of Power Plant:

Generating low-cost electricity is the key to the development of a growing country. Electricity is essential not only for Residential and Industries but also for agriculture. You may ask why electricity is important for agriculture. Because water is a common substance for agriculture.

If there is no nearby river then you have to go deep into the earth for water. Without electricity is nearly impossible to get water from deep earth. We are already habituated in our daily life with electricity which coming from a nearby power station. Even when you are reading this article by using your computer or cell phone then you are using electricity to keep alive your device.

So there is no way that we can live without electricity. For this reason, all power plants across your country keeping a good impact in our daily life by providing a smooth supply of low-cost electricity.

Related: What is the Difference in AC Current and DC Current?

Now I am going to give you some reason or advantage of why Electrical Power is so useful than any other source of energy.

1. Electricity is a convertible. According to demand, we can change its voltage level.
2. It’s easy to control.
3. It’s available.
4. Low cost according to fuel.
5. It’s clean and not harmful to nature.
6. We can transfer electricity at any distance by an overhead transmission line.

But after all this advantage lots of countries in this world are suffering from electricity and the main reason behind this is the source of energy to generate electricity. But our demand is getting higher day by day. For this reason, the power plant is much important to our national development.

Now if you have any questions according to with power plant then ask in a comment and don’t forget to share this article with your friends. Thanks!