MWM-Array Sensors for In Situ Monitoring of High-Temperature Components in Power Plants

Abstract

Utilization of America's substantial coal reserves for energy production has become a national priority. Advanced coal-fired power plants offer an environmentally friendly means to achieve that goal. These power plants, such as ultrasupercritical power plants, will provide high thermal efficiency along with greatly reduced emissions of CO 2 and other pollutants. Life cycle costs for the advanced coal-fired plants can be reduced by enhanced observability in support of condition-based maintenance. The enhanced observability can be achieved by using networks of condition-monitoring sensors that would provide component-level material condition information and through-wall temperature monitoring. This would reduce uncertainties in knowledge of material condition, at the level of individual components, and improve capability to predict remaining life of critical components. One approach being developed under the U.S. Department of Energy Small Business Innovation Research Program is to develop and implement high-temperature versions of the meandering winding magnetometer (HT-MWM) for temperatures upto 1000 C. These patented sensors, coupled with multivariate inverse methods, would provide superior performance for in situ material condition monitoring (material degradation, flaw detection, stress relaxation, and/or creep monitoring) and through-wall temperature measurement. Networks of HT-MWMs will generate material condition information to be used by adaptive life-management algorithms for remaining life prediction and decision support.Index Terms-Condition monitoring, high-temperature, meandering winding magnetometer (MWM), MWM-array sensors, power plant components.

A High-Sensitivity Flexible Eddy Current Array Sensor for Crack Monitoring of Welded Structures under Varying Environment

“…The signals of the sensor are affected by stress changes during the experiment, resulting in a lower sensitivity to cracks. JENTEK Sensors [ 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 , 19 ] has developed a variety of Meandering Winding Magnetometer (MWM) sensors for damage detection and quality evaluation of metal structures, including aeroengine blades, turbine disks, pressure vessels, oil pipelines and other structures with complex curved surfaces. In addition, the sensor has been used to crack monitoring of bolt-jointed structures.…”

Thermal decomposition of polyimides containing phosphine-oxide units

“…For example, in aerospace industry, the engine monitoring require that the sensor-containing polyimide films should be as close as possible to the engine, leading to their exposure at high temperatures [32,33]. Moreover, the exploration of new sources for clean energy, geothermal and electrical energy has significantly motivated the development of high temperature electronic materials [34]. High temperature sensors for structure health monitoring can ensure enhanced lifetime and reliability, less maintenance and downtime, and can thus reduce the cost of renewable energy sources [35].…”

Functionally graded ferroelectric polyetherimide composites for high temperature sensing

“…5,6 Moreover, exploration of new sources for clean energy, such as nuclear and wind power, as well as geothermal and electrical energy, has significantly motivated the development of high temperature electronic materials. 7 High temperature sensors for structure health monitoring can ensure enhanced lifetime and reliability, less maintenance and downtime, and can thus reduce the overall cost of renewable energy sources. 8,9 Piezoelectric materials can also be used to harvest mechanical energy from mechanical strain or vibrations present in the environment.…”