First Unit of Shenhua Shendong Electric Power's Wucaiwan Power Plant Begins Operations

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Researched by Industrial Info Resources China (Beijing, China)--The first unit (Unit 1) of Shenhua Shendong Electric Power Company Limited's (Shenmu, Shaanxi) Wucaiwan Power Plant was connected to the power-generation grid the first time on October 22, 2012, according to an announcement from China North Power Engineering Company Limited (NCPE) (Beijing), a regional subsidiary of China Power Engineering Consulting Corporation (Beijing) and the general contractor of the project, on October 25, 2012.

Through the joint efforts of related parties involved, the first unit of the project was ignited on October 17, 2012. On October 18, the generator cooling system began to fill with hydrogen. On October 20, the steam turbine was started up and ran to a rated speed of 3,000 rounds per minute (rpm) for the first time; electric testing then kicked off later in the day. On October 21, the over-speed test and tightness test for the main control valve of the steam turbine was completed. On October 22, the unit was connected to the grid with a load of 55.48 megawatts (MW).

The Wucaiwan Power Plant is located in Wucaiwan Town in the East Jungger Coal Field of northwest China's Xinjiang autonomous region, which is adjacent to Shenhua Xinjiang Energy Company Limited's (Urumqi, Xinjiang) Wucaiwan open-pit coal mine. The power plant has a total planned capacity of 8,700 MW, including two 350-MW, supercritical, indirect air-cooling units planned in Phase I and another eight 1,000-MW, ultra-supercritical, coal-fired units to be built in phases from 2012 to 2020. Upon completion, Wucaiwan will be one of the largest coal, power and chemical integrated cyclic economic demonstrative energy bases.

Commissioning of the unit paved a firm foundation for the load testing in the next stage. Presently, NCPE is working closely with related parties to try to get the 168-hour, full-load, continuous trial operation completed and handed over for commercial operations as soon as possible.

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