On November 27^th, 2001, the ChE 101 class took a trip to the Tracy/Pinion Pines Power Plant located about 17 east of Reno. The trip was relatively lengthy, but it was worth the drive. The first thing that I noticed was a man wearing coveralls and a hard hat walking around smoking a cigar. I though that was rather amusing. The second thing that I noticed was the security at the front gate. It was much more than I thought it would be. It took us about ten minutes before the security guard even let us through into the parking lot.

When we finally got inside, some of the employees issued each person in the class a hard hat and protective glasses. Then we began our tour. Our group began at the oldest side of the plant where two ancient oil burning generators are located. These diesel-powered monstrosities are the least efficient of the generators at the plant and are rarely in operation. The next generator, Tracy 3, is the 3^rd oldest and is slightly more advanced than the diesel powered machines. It has the ability to burn either oil or natural gas and has a better thermal efficiency than the older generators. The newest of the oil/gas burning generators is known as Tracy 4. It has the best efficiency of the 4 Tracy generators and is operation more than any of the other engines. Between these four generators and the Pinion Pines facility (which I will talk about later), the plant is able to produce about 580 million megawatts per year.

The newest technology that the plant has acquired is the Pinion Pines facility. This part of the plant is a revolutionary design, but still has many bugs to work out. The process is designed to gasify coal and purify this gas so it can be used in the generators. This is, by theory, done via a fluidized-bed gasifier. One of the huge advantages of this system is that most of the unwanted byproducts of coal burning are converted into solid waste agglomerates. These solids are suitable for landfill. This is a much better alternative than releasing these pollutants into the air. Also, since coal is so cheap right now, this would be a virtually free source of energy. Our guide said it costs more to transport the coal than it is to buy it. Even though this sounds like a perfect way to produce energy, it still needs some work. It is still in its experimental stages.

The largest turbine in the plant was located in a room by itself. This room was very noisy and we were required to wear earplugs. This turbine is capable of producing 115 million megawatts per year, which is enough power to sustain approximately 100,000 homes. The temperature inside the turbine is about 1000 degrees Fahrenheit and the water needs to be cooled down by water towers. The water used in these towers then passes through a clarifier, which extracts many of the salts so they don’t build up in the tower and clog it up. The clarifier uses many different catalysts and polymers to coagulate the salts so it can be taken to landfills.

After we looked at all of the equipment, we then took a trip to the control room. I found this room interesting because on one side is all of the controls for Tracy three and four. These plants were built in the 60’s and the controls consist of knobs, levers and older style gauges. On the other side of the room are the controls for the Pinion Pines facility. This plant was built in the nineties and consists of nothing but computer automated controls. It’s amazing how much technology has changed in the last forty years.

After it’s all said and done, the electricity is sent to transformers on the site and then on to the power "grid" where it can be sent to Reno or exported to other cities. When we were done we gave our hats and glasses back and went home.

Jake Ward

Class of 2005