Drax appoints Capula for new soot blower control system

Drax has appointed Capula (part of Imtech UK) to deliver a new sootblower PLC control system and motor control centre at its power station in North Yorkshire.

A sootblower is used to remove combustion deposits which build up on the furnace heat transfer surfaces in the boiler during combustion. At Drax Power Station there are some 120 soot blowers per generating unit - of which the power station has six, with a combined capacity of 4,000MW.

Capula’s scope of work will see the decommissioning and removal of the existing PLC and motor control cubicles ready for the installation of the new system. We will design, configure, manufacture and test the new sootblower PLC control system and new motor control centre, based on Schneider Electric Quantum PLC system and TeSys-U intelligent motor control starter technology.

The new system allows intelligent monitoring and control of the plant, providing Drax with advanced warning of electrical and/or mechanical issues, along with improved diagnostics to facilitate proactive preventative maintenance. All works will be carried out during an outage to ensure minimal disruption on site.

• Drax is currently in the process of converting three of its six generating units to burn sustainable biomass in place of coal, supported by systems integration expertise from Capula. With two of its generating units converted at the time of writing, it is already the largest biomass power station in the world.